The Use of Pragmatic Documents in Medieval Wallachia and Moldavia: Fourteenth to Sixteenth Centuries 9782503579900, 9782503582467

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THE USE OF PRAGMATIC DOCUMENTS IN MEDIEVAL WALLACHIA AND MOLDAVIA

UTRECHT STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL LITERACY

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UTRECHT STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL LITERACY General Editor Marco Mostert (Universiteit Utrecht) Editorial Board Gerd Althoff (Westfälische-Wilhelms-Universität Münster) Michael Clanchy (University of London) Erik Kwakkel (University of British Columbia) Mayke de Jong (Universiteit Utrecht) Rosamond McKitterick (University of Cambridge) Arpád Orbán (Universiteit Utrecht) Francesco Stella (Università degli studi di Siena) Richard H. Rouse (UCLA)

THE USE OF PRAGMATIC DOCUMENTS IN MEDIEVAL WALLACHIA AND MOLDAVIA FOURTEENTH TO SIXTEENTH CENTURIES

Mariana Goina

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

© 2020 – Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. D/2019/0095/3 ISBN 978-2-503-57990-0 e-ISBN 978-2-503-58246-7 DOI 10.1484/M.USML-EB.5.116383 ISSN 2034-9416 e-ISNN 2294-8317 Printed in the EU on acid-free paper

Contents Preface List of Figures and Graphs Abbreviations Map Introduction 1. Historical Background The Political History of Medieval Wallachia and Moldavia Church Organisation Social History Central and Urban Administrations Jurisdiction

ix xi xv xvii 1 7 7 14 17 20 23

PART 1. A SURVEY OF THE SOURCES 2. The Evidence: Archives and (Indirect) Sources Monastic Archives Private Storage of Charters The Importance of Indirect Evidence in Assessing the Spread of Pragmatic Literacy in Wallachia and Moldavia 3. Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince Land Charters

27 30 32 38 43 45

Contents

vi The Wording and Layout of Princely Charters Political and Commercial Treaties

48 58

Political Treaties; Commercial Treaties and Regulations; Enduring Oral Practices Recorded in Writing; The Textual Features of the Wallachian and Moldavian Treaties

Princely Letters for the Exchange of Information with Foreign Institutions

72

Missives Related to Diplomacy and Politics; Trade Regulations and The Settlement of Conflicts; Princely Requests for Foreign Goods Recorded in Writing; Other Personal Issues Addressed in Writing; Language and Layout of Moldavian and Wallachian Princely Missives

4. Diversification of Document Producers Documents Issued by the Moldavian and Wallachian Town Administrations

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Letters; Land Records

The Clerical Milieu as Producer of Pragmatic Documents

121

Land Records; Written Wills; Other Pragmatic Documents Issued by Religious Authorities

Documents Issued by Court Officials

136

Letters; Charters

Land Records Issued outside Institutions The Technical Literacy of Authors of Documents 5. Moldavian and Wallachian Chancery Scribes The Moldavian evidence The Wallachian evidence

154 160 167 168 175

Contents

vii Foreign Scribes Active in the Moldavian and Wallachian State Chanceries Scribes Employed in the Urban or Regional Offices Writers of Land Records at the Village Level The Cost of Having Charters Written Chancery Scribes as Proto-Diplomats The Education of the First Literates

179 182 184 185 187 188

PART II. USE AND DISSEMINATION OF PRAGMATIC DOCUMENTS 6. Records and their Uses

193

The Wallachian Context: Women’s (Lack of) Rights to Inherit Land and the Transition from Oral to Written Forms of Land Possession 195 The Practice of Fraternal Adoptions Used as Proto-Testaments 201 Economic Crisis, Social Conflict and the Use of Written Records to Endorse the Rights of Protimissis 203 Moldavian Charters and their Use 211 7. Falsification of Charters

221

8. Use of Written Evidence in Wallachian and Moldavian Dispute Settlements

225

The Wallachian Evidence

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Orality as a practice of a judicial process; Charter evidence as an aide-memoire; Charters as legal proof?

The Moldavian Evidence

235

9. The Use and Function of Land Charters beyond the Courts

245

10. The Perception of Land Charters

251

Contents

viii 11. Uses and Functions of letters and the Status of their Users The Function of Letters

257 257

Letters Used as Devices of Support; Letterss as Written Confirmations of Oral Agreements; Letters as Channels of Trust Building

The Status of Those Involved in the Exchange of Written Information 12. Uses of Written Documents in the Process of Government Administrative Letters Writs 13. The Documentary Culture of the Trader Milieu

267 273 273 280 287

Conclusions

293

Appendix: Reigns of the Wallachain and Moldavian Princes (Fourteenth to Sixteenth Centuries) Bibliography Index

307 309 325

Preface he idea of this book came almost twenty years ago. At the time, I was struggling with my MA at the Central European University on the subject of a Wallachian speculum principum. Trying to bypass a red herring of Romanian historiography, whether the Wallachian prince was the real author of the work, I ended up asking myself how literate the Moldavian and Wallachian princes and boyars might have been. The idea haunted me, and on the shelves of the CEU library I was happy to find the first volume of the then new collection of Utrecht Studies in Medieval Literacy, the New Approaches to Medieval Communication, edited by Marco Mostert. Having formerly dealt with a rather neglected topic concerning medieval mirrors for princes, I was thrilled to find a wider research community for my future research interests. It sealed my decision for the subject of my future PhD dissertation: The Use and Dissemination of Witten Culture in Medieval Wallachia and Moldavia, which was defended in 2009 and which served as the basis for this book. Ever since, the kindness and support of Michael Clanchy, Marco Mostert, and Anna Adamska was vital for keeping this project alive. To Anna Adamska, I owe thanks not only for her time and advice on how to put some sort of order in the scattered evidence, for providing books unavailable to me, and also for showing me how important it is to know how to keep on smiling in spite of everything. To Marco Mostert I am grateful for his trust and patience and for innumerable letters of support that I needed. Since the beginning of this project, I have been happy to enjoy the presence, help and advice of an innumerable list of kind people – the most fruitful experience of my life. I am glad to remember the kind figure of my Professor, Gheorghe Tohãneanu at Timiºoara University, as well as my good friends Lidia Rusnac and Vera Românu. But most of all I would like to show my gratitude to Michael Clanchy, for his never-ending attention and kindness, for his reading of drafts of this book, and

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Preface

for making me understand how valuable the deservedly praised student-teacher relationship in the Anglo-Saxon world really is. From CEU, my alma mater, I would like to thank my PhD advisor, Prof. Gerhard Jaritz, for his endless patience and willingness to help, Josif Laszlovski for his support, and Frank Shaer for reading drafts of this book, for providing me with lodgings whenever I needed to come to Budapest, and for becoming a good friend. From the new continent I am pleased to remember Lynne Viola, who was yet another instance of personified kindness and professionalism, Sara and Hans Hummer, who made my Fulbright fellowship fruitful and in whose house I felt at home. And the list could continue. I owe many thanks and apologies to my husband, for his more than human patience, and to my son, who grew together with this book, and often had to share my attention with it. I can say that he grew faster than this book and proved able to turn the language in which it is written into more or less readable English, for which I am more than grateful.

List of Figures and Tables Fig. 1

Confirmation of the village of Pinteleieºti to a Moldavian noblewoman Muºa, paniþa of pan Pentelei; the former charter was lost when her son died speechless, unable to communicate where the family charter was stored. 11 June, 1464. Braºov, State Archives, Episcopia Huºi, 38 /1. Photo: Mariana Goina.

Fig. 2

Prince Roman donates three villages to his servant Ioan㺠viteaz. First Surviving Moldavian Slavonic charter. 30 March 1392 (6900). Bucharest, National Archives-C, Colecþia Peceþi, no. 111. Photo: Mariana Goina. Trade treaty of Dan II on behalf of Braºov traders. 10 November 1424. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Privilegii, no. 774. Photo: Mariana Goina. Trade Treaty of Stephan the Great on behalf of Braºov traders. 13 March 1458. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Privilegii, no. 777. Photo: Mariana Goina. Trade treaty of Mircea the Old written in Latin, followed by the Slavonic treaty of Dan II. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Privilegii no. 768. Photo: Mariana Goina. Letter of Prince Basarab the Young to his wife, imprisoned at Brasov. Undated, c. 1480. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 106. Photo: Mariana Goina. One of the earliest Wallachian princely letters. Alexandru I Aldea asks Braºov traders for military aid against the coming Turks. Undated, C. 1432. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 306. Photo: Mariana Goina. Writ of Prince Mircea the Old prohibiting the contestation of monastic donations by the family of the donors. Undated, c.

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Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Fig. 6

Fig. 7

Fig. 8

49

68

69

70

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95

xii

Fig. 9

Fig. 10

Fig. 11

Fig. 12

Fig. 13

Fig. 14

Fig. 15

Fig. 16

Fig. 17 Fig. 18

Fig. 19

List of Figures and Tables 1402-1418. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I. No. 15. Photo: Mariana Goina. Will of nobleman Petriman on behalf of Cozia Monastery, written in the Monastery. 17 July 1425 (6933). Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 26. Photo: Mariana Goina. Palatine of Radu IV on behalf of Stanislav, who is acused by Marco, whose son came to Wallachia to teach Stanislav a foreign language but ran to the Turks. Undated, c. 1496-1504. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 536. Photo: Mariana Goina. Radu IV on behalf of Stanislav who is acused by Marco. Undated, c. 1496-1507. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 229. Photo: Mariana Goina. Former Wallachian palatinus Voico asks Braºov traders for a coat. One of the earliest extant private letters. Undated, c. 1431. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 530. Photo: Mariana Goina. Tricolici vornic, a Moldavian palatinus, writes from prison to his family. Undated, c. 1477. Braºov, State Archives, POB, no. 516. Photo: Mariana Goina. Deed of jupanita Stanca palatina, wife of Danciul, former palatinus, on behalf of her servant Alexie. 12 February 1598. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 1637. Photo: Mariana Goina. Deed from Wallachia (zapis). Dragoi sells his landed estate. Undated, c. 1596. Braºov, State Archives, S. I. No. 1590. Photo: Mariana Goina. Endowment of Neamþ monastery by Alexandru the Good; charter written by Bratei. 7 November 1409. Bucharest, National Archives-C, Mãnãstrirea Neam 21/1. Photo Mariana Goina. Example of a noble family tree to illustrate kin relations among scribes in sixteenth-century Moldavia. Deed comissioned by Fãtul the Old to turn one of his daughters, Stana, into a son. Written by scribe Ivan (Ivan gramatic), using a monastic template; no seals or fingerprints used. 11 March 1573 (7081). Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I. , no. 930. Photo: Mariana Goina. Prince Radu confirms the property of the villagers of Vaideea after a dispute with three other villages; formerly preserved at Bistri a Monastery. 1504. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 136. Photo: Mariana Goina.

125

131

138

139

145

148

152

158

168 174

197

209

List of Figures and Tables Fig. 20

Fig. 21

Fig. 22

Fig. 23

Fig. 24

Fig. 25

Fig. 26

Table 1 Table 2

Tampered charter. Boundaries and witnessess erased, with new information written in. The original charter was comissioned by Prince Alexandru the Good and written by Bratei. 1403. Bucharest, National Archives, Biroul Arhive Medievale, Fonduri Personale ºi Colecþii, Depozit 1C, Manastirea Pobrata, VIII/1. Photo: Mariana Goina. Princely summons listing oath helpers of Tismana Monastery; document formerly preserved at Tismana Monastery. Undated, c. 1561-1565. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 704. Photo: Mariana Goina. Letter of credence of prince Aldea to endorse the oral testimony of the prince’s envoy Dienish to Braºov. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 300. Photo Mariana Goina. One of the first Wallachian administrative letters. Dan II informs the custom post of Dâmboviþa on how to charge Braºov traders; stored in the town archives of Braºov. c. 1424. POB, Stenner, no. 5. Photo: Mariana Goina. Writ of Burtea, Grand Palatine (mare vornic), on behalf of Tismana, enabling the abbey of Tismana to keep the village of Grozeºti with his book. 27 March, c. 1558-1559, Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 631, Photo: Mariana Goina. Safe conduct issued by the Wallachian prince Alexandru I Aldea. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, Fond POB, Stenner, no. 310. Photo: Mariana Goina. Trade agreement between Dumitru and Voicu. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 77. Photo: Mariana Goina. Moldavian and Wallachian charters: numbers issued per decade. Extant fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Wallachian charters classified according to their beneficiaries.

xiii

222

229

258

274

282

288

289

46 124

Abbreviations BSA-C, S.I. BSA, POB DRH A DRH B DRH D DIR A DIR B

Bucharest State Archives – Central Collection, Secþia istoricã. Braºov State Archives, Primãria Oraºului Bistriþa. Documenta Romaniae Historica: Moldova, ed. C. CIHODARU, I. CAPROªU, et al., 18 vols. (Bucharest, 1969-). Documenta Romaniae Historica Þara Româneascã [Wallachia], ed. P. P. PANAITESCU, D. MIOC, et al., 23 vols. (Bucharest, 1965-). Documenta Romaniae Historica: Relaþii între Þãrile Române, ed. ª. PASCU, C. CIHODARU, et al. (Bucharest, 1977). Documente privind istoria României: Moldova, ed. I. IONAªCU, L. IONESCU-LÃZÃRESCU, et al., 11 vols. (Bucharest, 1951-1957). Documente privind istoria României Þara Româneascã [Wallachia], ed. I. IONAªCU, L. IONESCU-LÃZÃRESCU, et al., 13 vols. (Bucharest, 1951-1960).

Map

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Index

Introduction or the 1000 years following the Roman Empire’s withdrawal from Dacia, from the fourth century until the second half of the fourteenth, there are almost no traces of the use of writing in the area that was to become Moldavia and Wallachia.1 When, how, and for what purposes did the inhabitants of the two principalities begin to become accustomed to written word and its use? In other words, what were the major factors that triggered the appearance and dissemination of literacy in this area? The term literacy involves, but is by no means limited to, the ability to read and / or write. It also refers to a cultural model in which “writing is an important instrument of social communication”.2 The study of medieval literacy has enjoyed much scholarly attention especially since the 1980s. Previously, literacy was seen mainly as a new and revolutionary technology. Its spread, it was claimed, displaced former oral practices and affected the ways individuals thought and societies were organised.3 In his seminal work From Memory to Written Record: England 1066-1307, Michael Clanchy broadened the focus of literacy from the technology of writing to the uses of documents, the study of their perception, and the shift in the ways of thinking and acting that he calls

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Only two Slavonic and one Latin inscription that predate the foundation of these states have survived. The authenticity of Slavonic inscriptions is debatable. For more information see D. DELETANT, “Slavonic letters in Moldavia, Wallachia and Transylvania from the tenth to the seventeenth centuries”, in: Studies in Romanian History , 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1991), pp. 92-116, at pp. 92-93 and notes 4 and 5 for further bibliography. 2 A. ADAMSKA, “The study of medieval literacy: Old sources, new ideas”, in: The Development of Literate Mentalities in East Central Europe, ed. A. ADAMSKA and M. MOSTERT (Turnhout, 2004: USML 9), pp. 13-47, at p. 13. 3 J. GOODY, The Logic of Writing and the Organization of Society (Cambridge, 1992).

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Introduction

“the growth of a literate mentality”.4 Clanchy went beyond the study of literary texts, emphasising the need to focus on the much more common forms of literacy connected with pragmatic purposes and stressing the importance of “writing for ordinary business” rather than for writing literary or religious texts.5 Richard Britnell defined pragmatic documents “as a means by which almost any type of authority could be better safeguarded”. Among them, titles to property (the most numerous category of medieval records) offered greater legal security by making it possible to protect agreed boundaries and to expand memory, power, and control over possessions (and people).6 Marco Mostert further refined the concept of literacy by taking into consideration four different “registers of literacy” which help us to grasp variations in the understanding and perception of written texts and their uses in the process of communication.7 In recent decades consideration has focussed both on pragmatic and cultural approaches to literacy, extending its coverage to areas such as Medieval Scandinavia, the Netherlands, Russia, Poland, Hungary, and Serbia, and on refining its conceptual apparatus.8 Unfortunately, in Romanian historiography, the use of pragmatic documents in medieval Moldavia and Wallachia is hardly ever addressed. Among 4 M.T. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, 2nd edn. (Oxford and Cambridge, MA, 1993), p. 2. 5 CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 3. 6 R. BRITNELL, “Pragmatic literacy in Latin Christendom”, in: Pragmatic Literacy, East and West 1200-1300, ed. R. BRITNELL (Woodbridge, 1997), pp. 3-24, at pp. 3-4. 7 M. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, in: Strategies of Writing: Studies on Text and Trust in the Middle Ages, ed. P. SCHULTE, M. MOSTERT, and I. VAN RENSWOUDE (Turnhout, 2008: USML 13), pp. 37-59, at p. 41. 8 For a survey of the literature, see ADAMSKA, “The study of medieval literacy: Old sources, new ideas”, pp. 14-18; M. MOSTERT, “New approaches to medieval communication”, in: New Approaches to Medieval Communication, ed. M. MOSTERT (Turnhout, 1999: USML 1), pp. 15-37; A. NEDKVITNE, The Social Consequences of Literacy in Medieval Scandinavia (Turnhout, 2004: USML 11); M. MOSTERT, “The early history of written culture in the northern Netherlands”, in: Along the Oral Literate Continuum: Types of Texts, Relations and their Implications, ed. S. RANKOVIÆ, L. MELVE, and E. MUNDAL (Turnhout, 2010: USML 20), pp. 449-488. For the regional context, see A. ADAMSKA, “The introduction of writing in Central Europe (Poland, Hungary, and Bohemia)”, in: New Approaches to Medieval Communication, pp. 165-192; EAD., “‘From memory to written record’ in the periphery of medieval Latinitas: The case of Poland in the eleventh and twelfth centuries”, in: Charters and the Use of the Written Word in Medieval Society, ed. K. HEIDECKER (Turnhout, 2000: USML 5), pp. 83-100; I.G. TÓTH, Literacy and Written Culture in Early Modern Central Europe (Budapest, 2000); S. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, c. 950-1300 (Cambridge, 2004); D. BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia (Turnhout, 2014: USML 29); K. SZENDE, Trust, Authority and the Written Word in the Royal Towns of Medieval Hungary (Turnout, 2018: USML 41).

Introduction

3

the few studies are Radu Manolescu’s contributions on the urban culture in medieval Moldavia and Wallachia.9 Other studies of the last century were almost exclusively concerned with the history of books, the printing press, and particularly with the transition from Slavonic to Romanian as the language of writing.10 Apart from the nationalist approach specific for the period,11 the writing of the medieval centuries was seen almost exclusively in relation to religion.12 Little has changed in recent decades. The current explosion of works related to the study of (pragmatic) literacy does not find its counterpart in Romanian historiography. In my attempt to answer when and why written culture re-emerged on the territory of Moldavia and Wallachia, I will be concentrating on the appearance and dissemination of written documents and the formation of “literate habits and assumptions comprising a ‘literate mentality’”.13 I understand this literate mentality as the societal impact of cultural literacy, broadly defined as “the sum of social and cultural phenomena associated with the uses of writing”.14 Thus, by literate mentality, I refer to the tendency of people to take into account the use of writing for communication and record, as opposed to oral, customary means. This study will therefore not be limited to a survey of those who achieved technical mastery in a certain ‘register’ of written culture;15 it 9 R. MANOLESCU “Cultura orãºeneascã în Moldova în a doua jumãtate a secolului al cincisprezecelea” [Urban culture in Moldavia in the second half of the fifteenth century], in: Cultura moldoveneascã în timpul lui ªtefan cel Mare, ed. M. BERZA (Bucharest, 1964), pp. 47-97; ID., “Cultura orãºeneascã în Þara Româneascã în secolele XV-XVI” [Urban culture in Wallachia during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries], Analele Universitãþii Bucureºti: Istorie 18. 2 (1969), pp. 37-55. 10 L. DEMÉNY and L.A. DEMÉNY, Carte, tipar ºi societate la Români în secolul al XVI-lea [Book, print and society among the Romanians of the sixteenth century] (Bucharest, 1986); D. DELETANT “A survey of Romanian presses and printing in the sixteenth century”, in: ID., Studies in Romanian History, (Bucharest, 1991), pp. 116-130; I. GHEÞIE and A. MAREª, Originile scrisului în limba românã [The origins of written Romanian] (Bucharest, 1985). 11 See for instance E. STÃNESCU “Cultura scrisã moldoveneascã în vremea lui ªtefan cel Mare” [Moldavian written culture during the reign of Stephen the Great], in: Cultura moldoveneascã în timpul lui ªtefan cel Mare (Bucharest, 1964); P. PANAITESCU, Începuturile ºi biruinþa scrisului în limba românã [On the origins and victory of written Romanian] (Bucharest, 1965); ID., Introducere la istoria culturii româneºti [Introduction to the history of Romanian culture] (Bucharest, 1969). 12 E. TURDEANU, Études des littérature roumaine et d’écrits slaves et grecs des Principautés Roumaines (Leiden, 1985). 13 CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 185. 14 FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, p. 4. 15 Cf. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, pp. 40-41.

Introduction

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will trace the changes in the dominant cultural models that paved the way for the use of documents by many people, in a social context dominated by oral practices. In my approach, I am less concerned with ‘technical’ literacy (concerning some level of ability in reading and / or writing) than with ‘cultural’ literacy, which “implies some level of familiarity with, and mastery of, cultural activities in which reading and writing are used”.16 I thus enquire into the uses of the written word and the social functions of documents, taking into consideration documents produced for record keeping and for communication, the two main categories of documents defined as pragmatic. My decision springs from a number of motives. Following Clanchy, Britnell and Nedkvitne, I argue that pragmatic literacy (or “administrative literacy”, in Nedkvitne’s expression) “reveals the social consequences of literacy most clearly”.17 In addition to this, in Moldavia and Wallachia, up to the end of the sixteenth century, literacy did not extend beyond a restricted circle of professionals of whom we know next to nothing. For this reason, the only way forward involves expanding our research into enquiring by whom, how, and why documents were used, and trying to find out “the extent to which writing superseded speech and memory as the standard method of conveying and storing information”.18 Thus, following Mostert, my aim is to trace “the degree to which the written word was used in a certain society for a certain purpose”.19 The literature surveyed suggests that in spite of regional and chronological differences, certain patterns can be perceived in the early uses of writing. Notwithstanding a lag of several centuries, the types of surviving early Wallachian and Moldavian documents are similar to those of Carolingian Europe, AngloSaxon England and Medieval Scandinavia: the majority of early pragmatic documents feature records of land ownership, trade-related documents, or letters produced for the convenience of communication.20 In Moldavia and Wallachia, as elsewhere, land possession was not only an indicator of the wealth and status of a medieval man but a marker of his identity.21 Conse16

FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, p. 3. NEDKVITNE, The Social Consequences of Literacy in Medieval Scandinavia, p. 11. 18 Cf. S. KELLY, “Anglo-Saxon lay society and the written word”, in: The Uses of Literacy in Early Medieval Europe, ed. R. MCKITTERICK (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 36-62, at p. 36. 19 MOSTERT, “New approaches to medieval communication”, pp. 23-25. 20 Cf. NEDKVITNE, The Social Consequences of Literacy in Medieval Scandinavia, p. 10. 21 Cf. P. GEARY, “Land, language, and memory in Europe 700-1100”, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 9 (1999), pp. 169-184, reprinted in: Writing History: Identity, Conflict, and Memory in the Middle Ages, ed. F. CURTA and C. SPINEI, (Bucharest, 2012), pp. 248-267, at p. 250. 17

Introduction

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quently, land records were the most carefully preserved and they constitute the richest body of material available. Why studying Moldavia and Wallachia together? The two principalities stand out in the region, presenting parallel cultural and political developments, distinct from all their surrounding neighbours. Both reached statehood around the mid-fourteenth century, unusually late for South-Eastern Europe. Although the territories of the two principalities had belonged to the northern limits of the Roman Empire, subsequently written culture disappeared to be reborn unusually late. The first written documents surface in Moldavia and Wallachia by the end of the fourteenth century, a couple of centuries later than in neighbouring Transylvania, Serbia, Bulgaria, or Poland. These traits mark them as a case with its own, distinct characteristics. The organisation of the two principalities’ governments, societies, and Churches shows strong similarities. Also, they share similar idioms belonging to the Romance language group, they have in common the Greek Orthodox form of Christianity, and the use of Slavonic as their language of culture. In respect to the specificities of early written culture, there are differences between the two, especially in the first century following the states’ foundation, as Moldavian noblemen appear to be more accustomed to the use of written documents. However, when compared with their neighbours in the region, the two principalities form a unit, at least with respect to the advent of pragmatic literacy. That said, my work highlights both differences and similarities regarding the reception and dissemination of pragmatic documents in the two principalities. The time frame covered is mainly the period between the fourteenth and the end of the sixteenth centuries. The starting point is the organisation of a state administration and the attestation of the first documents produced in the Wallachian and Moldavian principalities. I have chosen to stop at the end of the sixteenth century since that point, in my reading of the data, marks the end of the period in which written culture had been very limited and technical literacy had been mastered only by professional literates. Until then, written documents were produced mainly at the institutional level. The types of surviving documents, which were basically used to prove ownership and for communication, also testify to restricted literacy.22 In Simon Franklin’s words, the

22

Cf. J.K. HYDE, Literacy and its Uses (Manchester, 1993), p. 217.

Introduction

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written culture of this period can be characterised as “a transition from nothing to something”.23 In the first part of the book, I structure the evidence according to the main categories of producers of surviving documents, asking how and why written documents reached Wallachia and Moldavia. I examine types of early documents and their producers. To what extent did writing offices become available and were disseminated within society, and who where the early literates? In the second part, I examine why the early documents began to be used, and by whom? What was the relation of written culture to orality and to the previous ways of doing business?24 Following on from this, what was the status of documents, and to what extent did their function and the way they were perceived change during the period? At the same time, I survey the relationship between early documents and power, asking to what extent a document was used to enforce decisions or exercise power.25

23

FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, p. 186. For the definition of orality see M. MOSTERT, “Orality, non-written communication and monastic studies”, in: Understanding Monastic Practices of Oral Communication (Western Europe, Tenth-Thirteenth Centuries), ed. S. VANDERPUTTEN (Turnhout, 2011: USML 21), pp. 367388, at p. 369. 25 Cf. A.K. BOWMAN and G. WOOLF, “Literacy and power in the ancient world”, in: Literacy and Power in the Ancient World, ed. A.K. BOWMAN and G. WOOLF (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 1-16, at p. 6. 24

Chapter 1

Historical Background The Political History of Medieval Wallachia and Moldavia he Medieval Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia rose to statehood around the period of the European Black Death and the great crisis of the fourteenth century.1 In the South-East of Europe this coincided with the collapse of the Danubian states of Bulgaria and Serbia and with the “rise of the most formidable military machine of the late Middle Ages”, that of the Ottoman Turks.2 The territories of the future Wallachian and Moldavian states belonged to the area known as the ‘Tartar region’. Under the Tartars, as formerly under other migratory people such as the Pechenegs and Cumans, the native population paid taxes in exchange for keeping with their traditional way of life.3 By the fourteenth century, as a result of the unified offensive of the Hungarian and Polish kingdoms against the Golden Horde, the power of the Tartars began to wane.4 The Wallachian and Moldavian state-building process can be seen as a result of the decline and withdrawal of Tartar power from these territories.

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1

In East Central Europe the crisis was felt to a lesser extent. For more information see B. MURGESCU, Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã [The Romanian Lands between the Otoman Empire and the Christian Europe] (Iaºi, 2012), p. 274. 2 R.W. SETON-WATSON, A History of the Romanians (Cambridge, 1934), p. 32. 3 H.H. STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village Communities: The Transition from the Communal to the Capitalist Mode of Production in the Danube Region (Cambridge, 1980), p. 31. 4 ª. PAPACOSTEA, “Relaþiile internaþionale în rãsãritul ºi sud estul Europei în secolele XIVXV” [International relations in South Eastern Europe during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries)], in: ID., Geneza Statului în Evul Mediu Românesc (Bucharest, 1999), pp. 254-278, at p. 256.

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Several denominations used by early Wallachian and Moldavian administrations, such as the names of certain taxes and of internal road systems, suggest that they maintained some features of the former Tartar administrative organisation of the territories.5 On the territory of the future principality of Wallachia two princedoms (voievodate), which were under suzerainty of the Hungarian kingdom, were unified around 1330.6 Around this date, the Vienna Chronicle records the victorious fight of Wallachia’s unifier, Basarab, against his former suzerain, Charles-Robert of Anjou, king of Hungary (1308-1342).7 The early Wallachian princes alternatively seem to have accepted and contested the role of the king of Hungary as their suzerain. For instance, in 1365, Louis of Anjou (13421382) declared prince Vladislav and his father Nicolae Alexandru disloyal and asked for an army to be conscripted to subdue the ungrateful subjects.8 The ensuing battle seems to have been lost by Vladislav and in 1368, in the first Wallachian extant political treaty, he acknowledged the Hungarian king as his suzerain.9 Early on in its existence, the Wallachian state became a vassal state of the Ottoman Empire, entering in this way into a complex relationship of dual vassalage. Payment of tribute, as a form of acknowledging Ottoman suzerainty, became regular soon after the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418).10 The Moldavian state was founded several decades after Wallachia.11 Following Polish-Hungarian pressure, the Tartar domination receded, leaving 5

STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village Communities, p. 33. ª. PAPACOSTEA, “Românii dupã marea invazie mongolã: între Regatul Ungar ºi Hoarda de Aur” [Romanians after the Mongol invasion: Between the Hungarian kingdom and Great Horde], in: Românii în secolul al XIII-lea: Între cruciatã ºi Imperiul Mongol (Bucharest, 1993), pp.136-174, esp. pp. 168-170. 7 Cronica pictatã de la Viena [The painted chronicle from Vienna], in: Fontes Historiae Daco-Romnorum, ed. Gh. POPA-LISSEANU, 15 vols. (Bucharest, 1934-1939), 11 (1937), pp. 22, 76, 89. 8 Documenta Romaniae Historica, series D, Relaþii între Þãrile Române (1222-1456) [Relations among the Romanian principalities], 1 vol. (Bucharest, 1977) (henceforth DRH D), No. 42 (1365). 9 DRH D, No. 46 (1368); ª. PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Româneºti la Naþiunea Românã” [From the foundation of the Romanian states to the Romanian nation]”, in: Istoria României, ed. M. BÃRBULESCU, D. DELETANT, K. HITCHINS, et al., 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 2012), pp. 120-178, at p. 131. 10 B. MURGESCU, România ºi Europa: Acumularea decalajelor economice [Romania and Europe: Increase of economic disparities] (Iaºi, 2010), p. 30; ID., Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã, pp. 277, 278. 11 N. IORGA, Istoria poporului românesc [The History of the Romanian people], ed. G. PENELEA, 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1985), p. 31. 6

Historical Background

9

behind only scattered villages. They would be unified around 1360.12 The new political entity was organised by the king of Hungary as a buffer territory between the kingdom and the Tartars.13 The first two ‘founding fathers’ mentioned by Moldavian chronicles came from the neighbouring province of Maramureº, part of the Hungarian kingdom. Hungarian suzerainty was soon contested by the early Moldavian rulers. Already by 1365, Bogdan (c.1363-c. 1367) seems to establish himself as the first autonomous Moldavian prince.14 In 1387, moving away from Hungary’s influence, Petru Muºat (c. 1375-1392) joined the Polish-Lithuanian union and signed the first known Moldavian treaty, becoming a vassal of the Polish king, Ladislas Jagello (1386-1434).15 From an early period of their existence, the Moldavian and Wallachian states were confronted by the Hungarian and Polish kingdoms, which claimed dominion.16 The principal object of dispute with these kingdoms related to the control of the commercial roads that crossed the territories of the two principalities and linked the Hanseatic and Levantine trade.17 As early as the end of the fourteenth century, to the Hungarian and Polish kingdoms’ claims to control the politics of the early states, a third factor was added: the growing influence of the Ottoman Empire.18 The formation of the Wallachian principality is poorly recorded in the contemporary evidence. It is alluded to in Hungarian royal charters. The conflict between the king of Hungary and the first Wallachian prince, Basarab, and the unsuccessful expedition of Charles-Robert of Anjou in Wallachia to prevent Basarab’s emancipation are mentioned in several Hungarian charters issued during the period.19 In Wallachian charters the ‘foundation of the coun12 IORGA, Istoria poporului românesc, pp. 218, 220; STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village Communities, p. 31. 13 ª.S. GOROVEI, Întemeierea Moldovei: Probleme controversate [The foundation of Moldavia: Controversial issues], 2nd edn. (Iaºi, 1997), p. 68. 14 DRH D, No. 43 (1365). 15 PAPACOSTEA, “Relaþiile internaþionale în rãsãritul ºi sud estul Europei”, p. 264. 16 ª. PAPACOSTEA and F. CONSTANTINIU, “Tratatul de la Lublãu ºi situaþia internaþionalã a Moldovei la începutul secolului al XV-lea” [The Lubowla Treaty and the Moldavian international position at the beginning of the fifteenth century] Studii 17.5 (1964), pp.1129-1140. 17 MURGESCU, Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã, pp. 274-275; PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Româneºti la Naþiunea Românã”, p. 134. 18 PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Româneºti la Naþiunea Românã”, p.136. 19 Documenta Romaniae Historica Series B, Þara Româneascã, ed. P.P. PANAITESCU, D. MIOC et al., 40 vols. (Bucharest, 1965-) (henceforward DRH B), 2, No. 156 (1517); DRH D, No. 23 (1332), No. 25 (1332); DRH B, 1, No. 24 (1332), No. 25 (1332), No. 29 (1335), No. 37 (1351); See also Cronica pictatã de la Viena, 11, pp., 22, 76, 89.

10

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try’ is recorded only at the turn of the sixteenth century.20 The process is described even later in the extant narrative evidence, as the earliest surviving Wallachian chronicles date from the end of the seventeenth century.21 The formation of the Moldavian state is better documented.22 Nevertheless, as in Wallachia, most information comes from diplomas issued by the king of Hungary and papal letters.23 In the local evidence the process is mentioned from the fifteenth century onwards, mainly in chronicles. This lack of evidence generated controversies on the process of foundation of these early states. While historians agree about the foundation of the Moldavian political structures by settlers from neighbouring Maramureº, the formation of the Wallachian state is subject of debate. It is unclear whether it was founded by local nobility or, similar to Moldavia, by outsiders.24 In my opinion, the scarcity of extant written evidence regarding landed property by the early Wallachian boyars suggests that, after the foundation of the Wallachian state, landowners continued administering their landed estates using their traditional (oral)ways. This supports Iorga’s opinion that Wallachia ‘grew from inside’, that the Wallachian state crystallised around a local ruler who managed to have his authority recognised by other local landowners.25 The main foreign force that influenced the politics of the late medieval Romanian Principalities was the Ottoman Empire.26 Its power over Wallachia grew over the fifteenth century, although some of the Wallachian princes tried to curtail the country’s dependence on the Ottomans until around 1462.27 The 20 DRH B, 2, No. 156 (1517); The Wallachian and Moldavian charters are dated according to the Byzantine Chronology. For reasons of convenience I use the modern dating system as calculated by the editors of the charters. 21 Cf. ª. PAPACOSTEA, “Geneza statelor româneºti: schiþã istoriograficã ºi istoricã” [The birth of the Romanian states: Historical and historiographical sketch], in: ID., Geneza Statului in Evul Mediu Românesc (Bucharest, 1999), pp. 8-33, at p. 13; M. RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary (London, 2000), p. 92. 22 PAPACOSTEA, “Românii dupã marea invazie mongolã”, p. 168. 23 DRH D, No. 43 (1365). 24 See, e.g. G. BRÃTIANU, Sfatul domnesc ºi adunarea stãrilor [The prince’s counsel and the estates assembly], 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1995), pp. 25, 66-7; PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Româneºti la Naþiunea Românã”, p. 137; L. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders: Medieval Towns in the Romanian Principalities (Leiden, 2010), pp. 130-131. 25 N. IORGA, Istoria poporului românesc [The history of the Romanian people], 4 vols. (Bucharest, 1922-1928), 1, p. 321; STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village Communities, p.15. 26 MURGESCU, Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã, p. 276; ID., România ºi Europa, p. 30. 27 V. PANAITE, Pace, rãzboi ºi comerþ în Islam: Þãrile Române ºi dreptul Otoman al po-

Historical Background

11

Ottomans became interested in Moldavian politics only after the fall of the Byzantine Empire. As a result, direct military confrontations with Moldavia began at the end of the fifteenth century, a century later than with Wallachia.28 Stephen III (known as Stephen the Great (1457-1504)) occupied the throne at that time. He managed to strengthen Moldavia’s position with regard to Poland and Hungary and had several periods of independent politics with regard to the Ottoman Empire. At the dawn of his reign, Moldavia began to acknowledge the Ottoman Empire as its suzerain and to pay the required tribute (1456). Until 1473, Stephen the Great tried to pursue his own political interests while continuing to acknowledge the Ottoman Empire as the suzerain power of Moldavia. Afterwards, for a short period (from 1473 to 1480) he took part actively in the fight against the Ottoman Empire, winning several battles. This entitled him to be placed among the “defenders of Christendom” by Pope Sixtus IV.29 After 1480, and especially after the loss of his major Black Sea trade centres, Chilia and Cetatea Albã in 1486, he acknowledged the military superiority of the Ottoman Empire and resumed paying tribute.30 The fall of Hungary at Mohács (1526) and the Polish-Ottoman alliance gradually brought the two principalities under intensified control by the Ottoman Empire.31 The attempts of Petru Rareº, son and successor of Stephen the Great, to maintain Moldavia as an autonomous regional actor triggered a powerful answer of the Turkish sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566). As a result, Ottoman dominance was established definitively over Moldavia as well. As vassals of the Ottoman Empire, the two principalities, in exchange for tribute (haraç) and various gifts to the sultan and Turkish officials, were granted autonomy in internal affairs: acknowledgment of their frontier and the authority of the local princes, recognition of the Orthodox faith and the limitation of the Ottoman presence on their territory. However, their foreign policy and poarelor (secolele XV-XVII) [Peace, War, and trade in Islam: Romanian countries and Ottoman Law of nations (fifteenth to seventeenth centuries)] (Bucharest, 1997), pp. 303, 310. 28 MURGESCU, România ºi Europa, p. 30; ID., Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã, p. 277. 29 For more information about Stephen the Great, see B. MURGESCU “Dimensiunea europeanã a lui ªtefan cel Mare” [Stephen the Great and Europe], in Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa creºtinã (Iaºi, 2012), pp. 15-28, and note 2 for further references. 30 SETON-WATSON, A History of the Romanians, p. 46. 31 MURGESCU, “‘Modernizarea’ Þãrii Româneºti ºi a Moldovei în secolele XVI-XVII. Tipare, particularitãþi, perspective” [Modernisation of Wallachia and Moldavia between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries: Patterns, specifics, perspectives], in: ID., Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa creºtinã, p. 304.

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their economy were ruled according to the stipulations of the Port. The Ottomans enjoyed the right of preemption in the purchase of Moldavian and Wallachian agricultural products. Moreover, the tribute paid by the principalities increased consistently over time. If during the fifteenth century their dues were symbolic, especially in Moldavia, after the mid-sixteenth century they were abruptly increased.32 There is another debate about the extent of the power of the Wallachian and Moldavian prince. According to Papacostea, the influence of Byzantine political culture allowed the Wallachian and Moldavian princes to assert the status of being God’s anointed, and therefore sovereigns.33 Indeed, the princely titles included the formula “anointed by God” and the vocable Io (most probably an abbreviation of the Greek Iovanes meaning the one chosen by God).34 Princes claimed dominium eminens: the ultimate ownership of all the country’s lands, even including the boyars’ ancestral estates.35 According to the evidence, both Wallachian and Moldavian boyars confirmed their inherited estates in charters granted by the princes. And the boyars’s estates reverted to the prince by default in case of treason (nota infidelitas) or due to a lack of heirs (defectus seminis).36 However, already by mid-fifteenth century, we see boyars contesting some of the princely rights. For instance, the practice of defectus seminis began to be challenged by Wallachian boyars after the mid-fifteenth century. Now the princes began to issue charters curtailing their own right of defectus seminis and granting Wallachian boyars without male successors the right to dispose of their estates. Consequently, even if in theory, Wallachian and Moldavian princes claimed sovereignty and divine rights, but in practice the power of most princes was restricted. 32

The Wallachian taxes were increased tenfold, from 10,000 golden coins paid before 1462 to 10, 000 golden coins in 1574-1583. In Moldavia, taxes were risen from a rather symbolic 2,000 golden coins (paid in 1456 for the first time) to 66,000 in 1583. For more information see B. MURGESCU “Comerþ ºi politicã în relaþiile româno-otomane” [Trade and politics in RomanianOtoman relations], in: ID., Þãrile Române intre Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã, p. 174 and note 8; See also ID., “Þãrile Române în epoca moderna timpurie”, in: Þãrile Române între Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa creºtinã, pp. 313-322; N. DJUVARA, Între Orient i Occident: Þãrile Române la începutul epocii moderne (1800-1848)[ Between East and West: The Danubian Principalities at the dawn of modern times], 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 2002), p. 24. 33 PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Româneºti la Naþiunea Românã”, p. 142. 34 F. SOLOMON, Politicã ºi confesiune la început de Ev Mediu moldovenesc [Politics and religion at the dawn of the Moldavian Middle Ages] (Iaºi, 2004), p. 26. 35 PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Româneºti la Naþiunea Românã”, p. 172. 36 Cf. RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 2.

Historical Background

13

The limits of princely power are further underlined by the law of succession. Neither in Wallachia nor in Moldavia a restrictive law of succession was practised. Any offspring of a reigning prince, including illegitimate sons, could claim the princedom. This practice meant that more often than not competing claimants fought for the throne.37 This struggle was aggravated by external factors and by the boyars’ factions. From the early fifteenth century, the rivalry between the Hungarian kingdom and the Ottoman Empire, both influential powers in Wallachian politics, resulted in the support of two branches of the Basarab dynasty, the Dãneºti and the Drãculeºti, who disputed the Wallachian throne.38 Occasionally, strong Moldavian princes also intervened in Wallachian fifteenth-century politics and managed to impose their own candidates. Thus, after Mircea the Old (1386-1418), whose reign was the lengthiest and most stable in the entire Wallachian Middle Ages until the end of the sixteenth century. The throne of Wallachia was held by 45 princes, so that the average reign of a prince did not exceed four years. And almost all reigns were fragmented a number of times by periods in which a contending prince succeeded in seizing the Wallachian throne. In the early decades of Moldavia’s existence, the dynamics of its politics resembled those of Wallachia, with a long succession of short and unstable reigns. At the beginning of the fifteenth century, the stable reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432) interrupted the intestine struggles and the state institutions were set up. The long reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504) also conferred greater stability on the Moldavian principality and helped to establish a strong line of succession. As a result, from the beginning of his reign in 1457 until the end of the first reign of his illegitimate son Petru Rareº in 1538, only four princes occupied the Moldavian throne. Afterwards, in the second half of the sixteenth century, political instability resumed. As a result, until the end of the sixteenth century the number of Moldavian ruling princes was 42, similar to the 45 of Wallachia. Moreover, after 1545 in Wallachia and several decades later in Moldavia (1572), princes began to be appointed by the sultan and his administration without any regard for dynastic principle, in accordance with the princes’ informal influence at Istanbul and the amount they paid in bribes.39 The only rule that was usually observed was the requirement that the candi37 38 39

p. 315.

SETON-WATSON, A History of the Romanians, p. 31. BRÃTIANU, Sfatul domnesc ºi adunarea stãrilor, p. 69. MURGESCU, România ºi Europa, p. 32; ID., “Þãrile Române în epoca modernã timpurie”,

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dates be of the Greek Orthodox faith. Only during the eighteenth century, under pressure from Russia, whose influence was then increasing in the Ottoman Lands to the north of the Danube, there were attempts to settle the term of office of the Moldavian and Wallachian princes at seven years. In practice, the short unstable office of the princes continued until 1829, when the protectorate of Russia was added to Ottoman suzerainty.40

Church Organisation The early Wallachian and Moldavian princes hesitated between Byzantium and Rome to proclaim their religious affiliation. At the dawn of the formation of the Wallachian and Moldavian princedoms, the Latin Church led an active campaign of expansion in the area.41 Numerous papal letters encourage Bulgarian, Tartar and Wallachian rulers to embrace the Catholic faith. This indicates the Greek Church’s earlier authority in the area.42 Apparently, the papal campaign appealed to at least some early Wallachian and Moldavian princes. A papal letter from 1345 acknowledges the success of the Latin Church’s campaign in Wallachia; Clement VI informs the king of Hungary that some Wallachian boyars, including the Wallachian prince Nicolae Alexandru (13521364), were swayed by the Latin Church.43 The religious affiliations of the early Wallachian princes, however, appear rather unstable. Later in his reign, Nicolae Alexandru apparently reconsidered his earlier allegiance and returned to the Greek Church. During his reign a metropolitan seat under the jurisdiction of Byzantium was established in Wallachia at Argeº (1359).44 However, the wording and layout of charters of the next Wallachian prince, Vladislav I (or Vlaicu) (1364-1377) strongly suggest another princely change of direction to a cultural milieu under the influence of the Catholic Church.45 Only from 40

B. JELAVICHI, Russia and the Formation of the Romanian National State: 1821-1878 (Cambridge, 1984), pp. 6, 11. 41 Documente privitoare la Istoria Românilor [Documents concerning Romanian history], ed. E. HURMUZACHI, N. DENSUªEANU, N. IORGA, et al., 19 vols. and 2 supplements (Bucharest, 1887-1936) [henceforth: Documente Hurmuzachi], 1, No. 443 (1301). 42 Documente Hurmuzachi, 1, No. 458 (1314), No. 476 (1327), No. 483 (1328), No. 516 (1337), No. 518 (1338), No. 520 (1338), No. 527 (1340). 43 Documente Hurmuzachi, 1, No. 551 (1345); DRH D, No. 32. 44 N. IORGA, Istoria bisericii Româneºti [The history of the Romanian Church], 2 vols, 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 2011), 1, pp. 45, 46-7. 45 DRH B, 1, No. 3 (1369), No. 5 (1372).

Historical Background

15

around 1374 both the foundation and endowment of a series of Orthodox monasteries and the layout of the extant charters consistently point to the Wallachian princes’ affiliation to the Greek Church.46 The evidence suggests that Latin bishops continued their activities on Wallachian territory. As early as 1381, a Catholic bishopric was established at Arges; however, its activity lasted only until the end of the sixteenth century, when, apparently due to the decrease in the numbers of Catholic population of Wallachia, it was moved to Moldavia.47 The organisation of the Greek Orthodox Church in Wallachia was set up later, under the prince Radu the Great (1495-1508) with the help of the former Ecumenical Patriarch of Byzantium, Niphon. He was brought to Wallachia in 1503 by the Wallachian prince and was granted the title of Wallachian metropolitan bishop. In his time of office two dioceses were established in Wallachia, at Râmnic and Buzãu.48 Almost a century later, according to the account of a catholic missionary, Franco Sivori, we learn that the organisation of the Orthodox Church had so far remained unchanged; Sivori mentions the same two Orthodox bishoprics of Râmnic and Buzãu.49 In Moldavia, the Church of Rome enjoyed a good standing during the early period.50 The papal letters sent to prince Laþcu (c. 1367-c. 1375) (in response to a princely request for granting spiritual legitimacy) suggests that the first option of the earliest Moldavian princes was directed towards Rome.51 The early Latin diocese, organised in the first Moldavian capital of Siret, was granted to Laþcu by Pope Urban V.52 Charters of Laþcu’s successor, prince Petru (1375-1392), issued on behalf of the Dominican Order continue to suggest the affiliation of the early Moldavian princes to the Catholic Church.53 Archaeological data from the Moldavian capital of his time (Suceava) further confirms 46

1, No. 6 (c.1374). RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders: Medieval Towns in the Romanian Principalities, p. 245. 48 M. PÃCURARU, Istoria Bisericii Ortodoxe Române [The History of the Romanian Orthodox Church], 5th edn., 3 vols. (Bucharest, 2000), 1, p.115. 49 Cãlãtori strãini despre Þãrile Române – Foreign Travelers about the Romanian Countries, ed. M. HOLBAN et al., 9 vols, (Bucharest, 1968-), 3, p. 13. 50 IORGA, Istoria bisericii Româneºti, 1, p. 83. 51 Acta Urbani Papae V (1362-1370), ed. A.L. TÃUTU (Rome, 1964), quoted by PAPACOSTEA, Moldova începuturilor între Latinism ºi Slavonism [Early Moldavia between Latin and Slavonic influences] (Bucharest, 2012), p. 8 and note 7. 52 IORGA, Istoria bisericii Româneºti, 1, p. 58. 53 Documenta Romaniae Historica, Series A, Moldova, ed. C. CIHODARU et al., 28 vols (Bucharest, 1969-) [henceforth DRH A], 1, No. 1 (1384). 47

DRH B,

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the prominence of the Latin Church in early Moldavia, as the remains of two Catholic churches have been identified, one built near the princely palace and the other one in the palace grounds.54 Only after the turn of the fifteenth century, the Byzantine Patriarchy succeeded in establishing an Orthodox metropolitan seat at Suceava, three decades later than the first Catholic diocese at Siret. According to Papacostea, this accomplishment of the Greek Church in Moldavia was aided by the formation of the Polish Lithuanian Union (1386) and its acceptance of the Greek Confession for its Ruthenian subjects.55 Iorga, however, explains the delay in the organisation of the first Orthodox diocese by a lack of agreement between the early Moldavian princes and the Greek Patriarchy over the Moldavian metropolitan bishops’ right of appointment and by the Moldavian princes’ reluctance to accept ecclesiastical officials of Greek origin.56 The first Moldavian metropolitan bishop, Iosif, apparently of Moldovan ethnic background, was confirmed in 1401.57 Regardless of motivation, in Moldavia we see that an Orthodox metropolitan seat, and even a mere bishopric, were organised quite late, during the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432).58 Moreover, if in his early reign Alexandru organised the Orthodox Church, later on his activities continue to suggest his support of the Catholic Church and its prominence in Moldavia. During his reign two Catholic bishoprics were set up in Moldavia, at Bacãu and Baia.59 Thus, in the early fifteenth century, we see a better organisation of the Latin Church in Moldavia, with three Catholic bishoprics functioning at Siret, Baia, and Bacãu. But these bishoprics seem to have been meant for the German and Hungarian Catholics who inhabited the Moldavian towns in large numbers. In the rural areas, ethnic Moldavians seem largely to belong to the Greek Church, as a Dominican monk, the bishop of Sultanieh, relates in the early fifteenth century.60 During the fifteenth century, two more Orthodox dioceses were set up in Moldavia. The first one, that of Siret, in the northern 54

For the Catholic community and its churches at Suceava, see RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 363. 55 PAPACOSTEA, Moldova începuturilor între Latinism ºi Slavonism, p. 9. 56 IORGA, Istoria bisericii Româneºti, 1, pp. 95-6; PAPACOSTEA, “From the foundation of the Romanian states to Romanian nation”, p. 133. 57 A. ELIAN, “Moldova ºi Bizanþul în secolul al XV-lea” [Moldova and the Byzantine Empire during the fifteenth century], in: Cultura Moldoveneascã în timpul lui ªtefan cel Mare, ed. M. BERZA, pp. 97-181, at p. 149. 58 IORGA, Istoria bisericii Româneºti, 1, pp. 61, 84-6. 59 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 455, 462. 60 Cãlãtori strãini, 1, p. 39.

Historical Background

17

part of the country, is attested from 1413, while that of Roman seems to have been established only in the second half of the fifteenth century (1458).61 To sum up, only after the first half of the fifteenth century the Greek Orthodox creed became the unchallenged official religion in both medieval Romanian principalities. Following the Byzantine tradition, we find here what was known as ‘Caesaropapism’, with the authority of the Orthodox Church being formally subjected to the authority of the princes.62 The activity of the Catholic Church was largely limited to the ethnic German and Hungarian communities. As in neighbouring Transylvania, the Catholic population of many Moldavian towns seems to have joined the Reformation movement, especially under certain princes of foreign origins, such as Iacob Heraclid (1561-1563) or Iancu Sasul (1579-1582).63 The influence of the Catholic Church experienced a short revival in Moldavia in the context of the Counter Reformation’s efforts of the second half of the sixteenth century, mainly during the second reign of Petru ªchiopul (1582-1591).64 However, because of the religious persecution practised by some Moldavian princes against nonOrthodox populations, the significantly Catholic population of the Moldavian towns steadily diminished by the end of the sixteenth century.65

Social History The social organisation of medieval Wallachia and Moldavia is hard to pin down. The evidence we have at our disposal – charters recording land ownership – hardly give an account of the distinctive features of the social strata and the boundaries and relations between them. Many scholarly debates evolved around attempts to determine how the status of the nobility was understood: whether noble status was dependent on landed property or derived from office61

PÃCURARU, Istoria Bisericii Ortodoxe Române 1, p.101. Pãcuraru ascribes the founding of the Rãdãuþi diocese to the fourteenth century; See also CIUREA, “Organizarea administrativã a statului feudal Moldova”, p. 158. 62 N. DJUVARA, A Brief Illustrated History of Romanians (Bucharest, 2014), p. 94. 63 IORGA, Istoria bisericii Româneºti, 1, pp. 221-226. 64 There is a busy correspondence of the Moldavian prince, his secretaries, and even of the Moldavian Greek Metropolitan Bishop of the period with the Pope and his officials, informing the latter on the sympathy of the Moldavian prince toward the Latin Church and on the good state of the Catholic Church in Moldavia (Documente Hurmuzachi, 3, No. 81 (1587), No. 85 (1588), No. 87 (1588), No. 96 (1588)). 65 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 465.

18

Chapter 1

holding.66 As there is no extant normative evidence about medieval fiscal obligations, all assumptions are subject to controversy. We have nothing comparable to the evidence of neighbouring Hungary, where Werböczy’s law code, the Tripartitum, defines nobility as being founded on an unconditional gift of land granted by the king.67 All we can see in the Wallachian and Moldavian evidence is, that the first leading men of both countries were referred to as boyar’ and were singled out because of their ancestry and land tenure.68 In the Moldavian charters they are usually referred to as pan (using the nobility mark of neighbouring Poland), and in Wallachia as jupan.69 We see them receiving land donations from the acting rulers in return for their services, but also having the princes confirming their ancestral estates. Their landed property seems to be fully owned, especially in Moldavia, as the charters stipulate that the donated land is given “to them and their offspring with the entire income”. In Wallachia, in the fifteenthcentury charters we see tax exemption granted to certain boyars, which suggest that boyars, as a social body, were not exempt from tax. In Wallachia, similar to Hungary, boyars’ estates were supposed to return to the ruler only in case of treason (nota infidelitas) and lack of male heirs (defectus seminis).70 In medieval Moldavia, noblewomen were entitled to inherit land, and defectus seminis was applied only in case of a lack of heirs. The order of the boyars listed as witnesses in the princely charters suggests that throughout the fifteenth century land tenure was regarded more highly than office-holding in the hierarchy of aristocracy in both principalities. Boyars without a court office were the first to be recorded among the witnesses of 66 C. GIURÃSCU, Despre boieri [On boyars] (Bucharest, 1920), pp. 9, 11; P. PANAITESCU, “Problema originii clasei boiereºti” [The issue of the origins of the noble class], in: Interpretãri româneºti, ed. ª.S. GOROVEI and M.M. SZEKELY, 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1994), pp. 31-65, at p. 32. For a recent account and full bibliography see ª. AFTODOR, Boierimea în Þara Româneascã: Aspecte politice ºi social-economice (1601-1654) [Boyars in Wallachia: Political, social, and economic aspects] (Brãila, 2014), pp. 22, 25. 67 Cf. S. WERBÕCZY, The Customary Law of the Kingdom of Hungary In Three Parts (1517), ed. and trans. J. BAK et al. (Idyllwild and Budapest, 2005), pp. 50-52; RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 4. 68 For Moldavia, see DRH A, 1, No. 2 (1392), and No. 4 (1393). 69 N. STOICESCU, Sfatul domnesc ºi marii dregãtori din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova (sec. XIV-XVII) [The princely council and the Wallachian and Moldavian court officials (fourteenthseventeenth centuries)], pp. 27-28; For the title jupan, of Serbian origins, see G. MIHAILÃ, Studii de lexicologie ºi istorie a lingvisticii româneºti [Studies on the lexicology and history of the Romanian language] (Bucharest, 1973), p. 8. 70 Cf. STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village Communities, pp. 85.

Historical Background

19

princely charters, while those holding state offices came at the end of the list.71 Presumably, the first names listed represent the powerful landowners who backed the prince. In Wallachia we also see high ecclesiastical officials and priests among the first witnesses mentioned.72 And as early as the first half of the fifteenth century the palatinus (vornic) sporadically occupies the first position among the witnesses of charters.73 However, beginning with the reign of Radu the Great (1495-1507) in Wallachia and with the last years of the reign of Stephen the Great in Moldavia (1457-1504), office holders become the only witnesses listed in princely charters. The boost in status and economic power of court office holders is especially noteworthy after the turn of the sixteenth century, particularly in Wallachia. During its short-lived control of a part of Wallachia (1718-1739), the Habsburg administration attempted to identify for the first time the criteria for assessing nobility. This account, which was highly contested, stated that in Wallachia, with very few exceptions, the true hereditary nobility had been extinguished by endemic political instability. Consequently, it was decided that only those involved in the state services were assigned to the noble class, and were therefore exempt from paying taxes.74 In the subsequent administrative reforms of prince Constantin Mavrocordat (1739), the definition of the noble class remained linked to the state services.75 Lack of evidence has led to further confusions about Wallachian and Moldavian medieval society. In the 1960s, following the approaches of Western historians, some attempts were made to describe the internal organisation of Wallachian and Moldavian medieval society as a web of hierarchical feudal relations among vassals and their lords, similar to France.76 Henri H. Stahl claimed that, on the contary, in Wallachia and Moldavia a multi-layered hierarchy of feudal relations cannot be traced in the evidence.77 Boyars were subject 71

DRH A, 1, No. 4 (1393), No. 10 (1400), and No. 31 (1411); DRH A, 2, No. 122 (1464) and No. 265 (1486). 72 DRH B, 1, No. 10 (1389) and No. 77 (1436). 73 DRH B, 1, No. 86 (1437) and No. 87 (1437). 74 ª. PAPACOSTEA, Oltenia sub stãpânirea austriacã 1718-1739 [The region of Oltenia under the Austrian administration] (Bucharest, 1998), pp. 144-5, at p. 144; C. GIURESCU, Material pentru istoria Olteniei supt austriaci, 1, pp. 594-5 75 GIURESCU, Despre boieri, p. 13. 76 See, e.g. V. COSTÃCHEL, P.P. PANAITESCU, and A. CAZACU, Viaþa feudalã in Moldova ºi Þara Româneascã (Bucharest, 1957); For a full bibliography see STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã [Controversial issues about Romanian social history] (Bucharest, 1969), pp. 70, 105, 122. 77 STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã, p. 70.

Chapter 1

20

directly to the prince, and we may presume that in the medieval Romanian principalities, similar to Poland and Hungary, all noblemen had an equal legal status. The only general agreement on medieval Romanian social history was that, at the very beginning of state formation, there were large numbers of free peasants, organised in communal villages.78 This aspect brings the social history of Wallachia and Moldavia close to the general features of Eastern Europe, where peasants originated from free village communities and fell gradually into serfdom. This happened quite late, beginning with the sixteenth century.

Central and Urban Administrations The administrative structure of medieval Wallachia and Moldavia reflects the late centralisation of the principalities and their enduring regional specificities. In Moldavia, the late integration of the southern parts into the state structures resulted in the division of the state organisation into two regions called the upper country (Þara de sus) and the lower country (Þara de jos).79 The centralisation of Moldavia seems to have started in the long reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504).80 In Wallachia, the administrative structures also suggest a slow process of centralisation. The region of Oltenia enjoyed a strong autonomy within the structure of the Wallachian state.81 No princes’ residences are attested in Oltenia, and no princely charters that were issued there survive.82 All Wallachian historical capitals are consistently located outside of Oltenia. However, the head of the province of Oltenia, the ban, seems integrated into the political elite of the Wallachian state and he recognised the Wallachian prince as the highest political instance of the state. The ban’s residence was the town of Craiova, where one of the earliest regional chanceries was established. Charters commissioned by the Craiova ban are attested from the early fifteenth century. However, these charters, similarly to other Wallachian land records 78

STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village communities, pp. 6-7. PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Romãneºti la Naþtiunea Românã”, p. 145. 80 D. CIUREA, “Organizarea administrativã a statului feudal Moldova (sec. 14-18)” [Administrative structure of the medieval Moldavian state], Anuarul Institutului de Istorie ºi arheologie 2 (1965), pp. 143-237, at p. 156. 81 PAPACOSTEA, “De la Geneza Statelor Romãneºti la Naþtiunea Românã”, p. 145. 82 Cf RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 139. 79

Historical Background

21

issued outside the princely chancery, needed to be confirmed by the princes. One can see this as a limitation of the ban’s power. From an early period, the territories of medieval Wallachia and Moldavia began to be divided into counties.83 In the Wallachian evidence, the counties (judeþ) began to be recorded as early as the reign of Mircea the Old (13861418).84 Iorga argued that the administrative division of Wallachia was done according to former pre-state enclaves.85 In Moldavia, the administrative division of the territory into counties (þinut) seems to have come about only after the turn of the fifteenth century. Apparently, in Moldavia the counties were shaped ex novo, along with urban settlements and castles.86 We learn of the first Moldavian county official, the ‘constable’ (pîrcãlab) in 1435, and a list of 24 Moldavian counties is recorded in a chronicle from 1566.87 The head official of a county is called ‘constable’ (pîrcãlab) but the evidence is very confusing as after the mid-sixteenth century officials named starosta and vãtav also appear at the head of the Moldavian counties. In the Wallachian evidence these county officials are referred to as cãpitan.88 The earliest Moldavian and Wallachian towns developed together with the state structures, beginning with the fourteenth century.89 The general process of colonisation of the European margins by German colonists had reached the Moldavian and Wallachian lands during the thirteenth century.90 The contribution of foreign settlers in the institutional development of the earliest Wallachian and Moldavian towns was decisive. The German community introduced most administrative institutions in the early towns. The status of German settlers was regulated by the central power on the principles of the so-called German Law, presumably on the base of a written privilege.91 The towns’ inhabitants were granted individual freedom and freedom of worship, they were entitled to choose their own representatives, and were judged by their own 83

The first mention of the county structure in Moldavia dates from 1408. See CIUREA, “Organizarea administrativã a statului feudal Moldova”, p. 152. 84 DRH B, 1, No. 7 (1385) and No. 8 (1387). 85 IORGA, Istoria poporului românesc, 1, p. 322. 86 Ibid. 87 CIUREA, “Organizarea administrativã a statului feudal Moldova”, pp. 156, 159-160. 88 PANAITESCU, “Comunele medievale în Principatele Române”, 131. 89 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 21. 90 Cf. A. ADAMSKA, “Away with the Germans and their language? Linguistic conflict and urban records in early fourteenth-century Cracow”, in: Uses of the Written Word in Medieval Towns, ed. M. MOSTERT and A. ADAMSKA (Turnhout, 2014: USML 28), pp. 65-85, at p. 67. 91 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders ), pp. 133, 183-4, 188, 194, 393.

Chapter 1

22

judges.92 They fully owned the landed estates within their settlement boundaries and often enjoyed exemptions from customary duties for certain products.93 However, from an early period, as the princes had a superior right over their domains, the towns had to accept representatives of the central power on their territory. In the Wallachian and Moldavian towns we therefore see an institutional dualism: the representatives elected by the town communities were joined by the princes’ representatives.94 The autonomous town authorities consisted of a leader referred to as judeþ in Wallachia and ºoltuz in Moldavia and twelve council members named pârgari.95 It seems that the name of the town leader could vary in the evidence according to the ethnic community he was meant to represent: he could also be called graf, richter, or voit. The towns’ leaders were chosen on a yearly basis by the town’s most numerous ethnic community.96 It seems that when more than one considerable ethnic group inhabited a town, the right of appointment was granted alternatively to each one.97 Princely authority in the towns was enforced, and taxes were levied by the town palatine (vornic de oraº, vornic de târg). They seem also to be referred to as ureadnic in Moldavia and as pârcãlab in Wallachia.98 The town officials, chosen by the communities, had to be confirmed by the princely officials, which indicated a form of subordination. The presence of princely officials in the towns is attested from the early fifteenth century in Moldavia but only after the mid-sixteenth century in the Wallachian data.99 In Moldavia, they are considered to be the earliest representatives of the central power locally, the supreme instances in the given region until the later administrative division. In Wallachia, they seem to be of lesser importance.100 92

C.C. GIURESCU, Târguri sau oraºe ºi cetãþi moldovene din secolul al X-lea pânã la mijlocul secolului al XVI-lea [Moldavian marketplaces or towns and fortresses from the tenth to the mid-sixteenth century], 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1997), p. 129. 93 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p.184. 94 P.P. PANAITESCU, “Comunele medievale în Principatele Române” [Medieval villages in the Romanian Principalities], in: ID., Interpretãri româneºti: Studii de istorie economicã ºi socialã, ed. Gorovei and M.M. Szekely, 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1994), pp.119-161, at p. 128; RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 184. 95 PANAITESCU, “Comunele medievale în Principatele Române”, p. 129. 96 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 186, 396. 97 Cãlãtori strãini, 7, p. 452. 98 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 187, 413. 99 They are mentioned in evidence from 1403. See DRH A, vol. 1, No. 17; cf. PANAITESCU, “Organizarea administrativã a statului feudal Moldova”, p. 153. 100 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 198.

Historical Background

23

Jurisdiction In Medieval Wallachia and Moldavia conflicts were settled on the basis of customary law.101 Until the end of the eighteenth century, the sole source of written law consisted of compilations based on Byzantine nomo-canons.102 The Slavonic translations of these canon law manuscripts were among the first to be copied, translated into Romanian, and printed in medieval Wallachia or Moldavia.103 The first local seventeenth-century law codes are still compilations of Byzantine canon law manuscripts with no insertions relative to local practices.104 Unfortunately, the Wallachian and Moldavian local customs were never put into writing.105 The Byzantine law codes were presumably intended as instruments to express Christian identity, or the princes’ claim to be guardians of the Byzantine tradition rather than as a body of reference for the exercise of law.106 Iorga considered one of the seventeenth-century law codes rather as a literary curiosity than as a practical instrument.107As far as we can observe, the law codes were hardly ever mentioned in the civil cases judged at the princely courts.108 101

Cf. M. MOSTERT “The early history of written culture in the northern Netherlands”, p.

480. 102 For the history of written law in the medieval Romanian principalities, see E. CERNEA and E. MOLCUT, Izvoarele dreptului Românesc [Sources of Romanian Law] (Bucharest, 2003). 103 V. ALEXANDROV, The Syntagma of Matthew Blastares: The Destiny of a Byzantine Legal Code among the Orthodox Slavs and Romanians (Frankfurt am Main, 2012: Forschungen zur byzantinischen Rechtsgeschichte 29); FRANKLIN, Writing, Society, and Culture in Early Rus, p. 136. 104 For more information about seventeenth century law-codes, see Carte româneascã de învãþãtura, ed. A. RÃDULESCU et al. (Bucharest, 1961); Îndreptarea legii 1652, ed. A. RÃDULESCU et al. (Bucharest, 1962); Gh. CRONÞ, “Dreptul bizantin în þãrile române: Îndreptarea Legii din 1652” [Byzantine law in the Romanian principalities: The law code from 1652], Studii: Revista de Istorie 13.1 (1960), pp. 57-83; ID., “Pravila de la Govora” [The law code of Govora], Studii: Revista de istorie 14.5 (1961), pp. 1211-1227; ID., “Byzantine juridical influences in the Romanian Feudal Society”, Revue des Études Sud Est Européennes 2.3-4 (1964), pp. 369-383. 105 STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã româneascã, pp. 17, 19 and note 13. 106 Cf. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society, and Culture in Early Rus, p. 140; S KEYNES, ‘Royal government and the written word in late Anglo-Saxon England’, in: The Uses of Literacy in Early Medieval Europe, ed. R. MCKITTERICK (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 226-257, at p. 228; A.K. BOWMAN and G. WOOLF, “Literacy and power in the ancient world”, p. 1; STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã româneascã, p. 19. 107 IORGA, Istoria literaturii româneºti, 1, p. 248. 108 V. HANGA, “Le droit romano-byzantine a-ti-l été reçu dans les Principautés Roumaines?”, Revue Roumaine d’Histoire 2 (1971), pp. 237-255, at p. 241.

24

Chapter 1

Only with the start of the eighteenth century, certain princely resolutions were stated as taken according to written law codes.109 From the medieval period, the written evidence is restricted only to descriptive evidence contained in charters issued in the course (or at the conclusion) of judicial proceedings. In Wallachia and Moldavia, similar to Byzantium, the prince’s was the final judicial forum, and princely charters continued to have an almost exclusive legal value.110 Serfs had to settle their cases first in front of their masters, and only afterwards could they address their plaints in front of princes.111 Although the duties of regional and urban state officials involved dispensation of justice on behalf of free villagers and courts were held at the local level, charters issued in consequence of a dispute settlement by regional and urban officials seldom survive. And if they do, they hardly ever specify the proceedings of the local courts.112 As custom required that charters issued outside the princely office be confirmed by the prince, the surviving charters issued as a result of a judicial process come almost exclusively from the princely chanceries. Ecclesiastical courts were also assembled. Scant indirect evidence points to a variety of documents used in their proceedings and apparently their resolutions could also be written down.113 The Byzantine collections of ecclesiastical law, which were lavishly copied in Moldavia and Wallachia, could have been used by ecclesiastical courts. One of the first vows of a new appointed bishop was to observe the ‘written law’ (pravila).114 Unfortunately, the data about the way in which ecclesiastical courts functioned and used written documents are extant mainly from the eighteenth century.115

109 Acte judiciare din Þara Româneascã 1775-1781, ed. Gh. CRONÞ, Al. CONSTANTINESCU, et al. (Bucharest, 1973). 110 Cf. R. MORRIS, “Dispute settlements in the Byzantine provinces in the tenth century”, in: The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe, ed. W. DAVIES and P. FOURACRE (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 125-148, at p. 126. 111 DRH A, 2, No. 134 (1466). 112 Cf. V. GEORGESCU and O. SACHELARIE , Judecata domneascã în Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova (1611-1831), 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1982), 2, pp. 10, 11. 113 Documente privind historia României, Seria A Moldova, ed. I. IONAªCU, B. CÎMPINA, and L. LÃZÃRESCU-IONESCU, 11 vols (Bucharest, 1951-1957), [henceforth DIR A], 4, No. 363 (1600). 114 DIR A, 4, No. 357. 115 Gh. CRONÞ, “Instanþele de judecatã ale bisericii din þãrile române în secolele XIV-XVII” Mitropolia Moldovei ºi Sucevei 52.5-6 (1976), pp. 338-360, at p. 339.

Part I: A Survey of the Sources

Chapter 2

The Evidence: Archives and (Indirect) Sources rom the period up to the end of the sixteenth century, circa 6,500 charters recording land conveyances, endowments, and dispute settlements have survived from the principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia. The overwhelming majority of these were issued at the princely level. They are preserved as individual texts either in their original form, as copies, or in translation. Very few charters come from late monastic cartularies or are mentioned in later princely charters; they are entirely related to the ownership of land. From foreign archives comes another body of material in the form of political and commercial treaties and letters. Several hundred Wallachian and Moldavian pragmatic missives (mainly political and commercial) have survived in their original form. The majority of these letters are stored in the archives of the Transylvanian towns of Braºov (Kronstadt) and Bistriþa (Bistritz).1 The

F

1

Letters were not edited systematically. The early twentieth century editions are focussed on certain periods, areas, or languages. Among the most important editions of Latin letters preserved in the urban archives of the Transylvanian towns are edited by N. Iorga and Veress. See Acte ºi scrisori din arhivele oraºelor ardelene (Bistriþa, Braºov, Sibiu) [Documents and letters from the Transylvanian urban archives (Bistriþa, Braºov, Sibiu)], in: Documente de istorie a României. Colecþia Hurmuzachi, vol.15.1 (1358-1600), ed. N. IORGA. (Bucharest, 1911). Slavonic letters were edited by Ioan Bogdan; see Documente privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã (Bucharest, 1905) and Documente ºi regeste privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi Ungaria (Bucharest, 1902); Slavonic letters were also edited by Nicolae Tocilescu; see 534 documente slavo-române, ed. N. TOCILESCU (Vienna, 1934); Moldavian letters were edited by Mihail Costãchescu in several collections organised according to the most important princely reigns; for the edition of the sixteenth-century Romanian documents, see Documente Româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea [Romanian documents from the sixteenth century], ed. Gh. CHIVU, M. GEORGESCU, and A. MAREª, (Bucharest, 1979); The few unedited sixteenth-century documents from the Bistriþa town archives are preserved in the Cluj

28

Chapter 2

town archive of Braºov holds the richest collection of Wallachian letters. The main body of letters from medieval Moldavia is kept in the Bistriþa town archives. Moldavian evidence from Braºov is rare; it comprises only around two dozen documents.2 Another Transylvanian town, Sibiu (Hermannstadt), had dynamic political and commercial relations with the Moldavian and Wallachian principalities; unfortunately, most of the medieval Wallachian and Moldavian corpus of documents from the urban archives of Sibiu has been lost, with only 23 letters remaining.3 Other collections of Moldavian political letters come from Polish,4 Hungarian, Austrian and German state archives.5 Wallachian letters are only patchily preserved in the archives of Western European states. The political correspondence of the Wallachian prince Michael the Brave (1593-1600) is one of the few exceptions; fragments of his correspondence are preserved in German, Austrian, and Polish state archives.6 The evidence of letters survives as one-sided correspondence; letters sent to Wallachian and Moldavian institutions are presumably irretrievably lost. Only occasional examples of letters, written by Braºov town officials, have come down to us.7 No reference to registers or to books of copies of letters received can be found in either Wallachia or Moldavia. Apparently, registers of letters issued were not even kept in the urban archives of the Transylvanian towns.8 The Transylvanian town archives do bring to light a bunch of administrative letters exchanged between Wallachian and Moldavian princes and their state officials. Most of these are written on behalf of Transylvanian traders. State Archives, Collection POB. 2 Documente moldoveneºti din secolul XV ºi XVI în arhivul Braºovului [Fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Moldavian documents in the Braºov archives], ed. I. BOGDAN, (Bucharest, 1905). 3 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã în secolul XV ºi XVI [Wallachian Relations with Braºov and Hungary during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries], ed. and trans. I. BOGDAN (Bucharest, 1905), p. v. 4 Documente culese din arhive ºi biblioteci polone [Documents from Polish Archives and Libraries], in Colecþia Hurmuzachi, Supplement 2, ed. and trans. I. BOGDAN (Bucharest, 1893),. 5 See, e.g. Acta et epistolae relationum Transylvaniae Hungariaeque cum Moldaviae et Valachia, 1468-1540, ed. E. VERESS (Budapest, 1914); Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului, Moldovei ºi Þãrii-Româneºti: Acte si scrisori, 1527-1690, ed. E. VERESS, 11 vols. (Bucharest, 1929-1939). 6 It was edited by N. Iorga. See Acte relative la rãzboaiele ºi cuceririle lui Mihai Viteazul, ed. N. IORGA, in: Documente Hurmuzachi 12 (Bucharest, 1902). 7 See, e.g. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 190 (c. 15121521), No. 191 (c.1523), No. 192 (1530-1532), and No. 195 (c. 1536). The letters are undated; they were dated by the editor to the first half of the sixteenth century. 8 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, p. xxv.

The Evidence

29

It is hard to interpret this pattern of survival.9 The sparse record, similar to that of Carolingian Europe or Anglo-Saxon England, leaves open the question of whether the scarcity of data is due to a lack of use of pragmatic documents or to their poor survival.10 What we can see from the surviving evidence is, that early documents were mostly used for communication and record keeping. Furthermore, apparently on the territory of Wallachia and Moldavia only documents related to land tenure were considered worth keeping. It seems that filtering mechanisms that caused some categories of documents to be kept and others to be destroyed were particularly restrictive here. Had some Wallachian and Moldavian missives not been stored abroad, medieval evidence would have been limited to records of land ownership; consequently, we would have been entitled to assume that the use of early writing was confined to the keeping of records concerning landed property. At the risk of stating the obvious, the body of material to be found in foreign archives indicates once again the extent to which our perception is influenced by the chances of survival. Presumably, the late and slow birth of state institutions in Wallachia and Moldavia is responsible for poorer practices of safekeeping documents even compared to the other countries of the Orthodox faith, where princely and urban archives also come into view late. It is also in the archives of towns abroad that medieval letters originating from Russia and Serbia have chiefly been preserved.11 In Wallachia and Moldavia, for the period up to the end of the sixteenth century, we have neither any mention of princely registers of documents kept or used, nor references to an official depository of documents. Only urban and monastic registers are mentioned in the medieval evidence. In these circumstances any inquiry into institutionally defined archival practices may appear fruitless.12 The only way forward is to look for the practicalities concerning document storage. Documents related to land ownership seem to have been 9

Cf. W.C. BROWN, “The gesta municipalia and the public validation of documents in Frankish Europe”, in: Documentary Culture and the Laity in the Early Middle Ages, ed. W.C. BROWN, M. COSTAMBEYS, M. INNES, and A. J. COSTO, (Cambridge, 2014), pp. 95-124, at p. 115. 10 Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, NEDKVITNE, “Administrative Literacy”, p. 288. 11 FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, p. 186; BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, pp. 65, 67. 12 Cf. M. INNES, “Archives, Documents and Landowners in Carolingian Francia”, in: Documentary Culture and the Laity in the Early Middle Ages, pp. 152-188, at p. 115.

Chapter 2

30

kept only in monastic archives and in private collections. Exceptionally, Moldavian boyars’ charters are preserved in the Polish state archives, as Moldavian boyars had close links with the kingdom of Poland and many of them emigrated there.13

Monastic Archives In the medieval Romanian principalities, as elsewhere, the earliest institutional storing of charters seems to have taken place in religious houses. In Wallachia, the existence of monastic archives is suggested by the contemporary dorsal notes on fifteenth-century charters. These notes usually include the name of the beneficiary and the object of a donation, most often a landed property. The first of these contemporary notes is recorded on a charter of 1419 granted to Tismana and Vodiþa monasteries by the Hungarian king Sigismund of Luxemburg (1368-1437).14 It testifies to an early setting-up of the monastic archive of Tismana monastery, where many original charters were stored until the modern period.15 The information that monastic charters were used as proof in court cases suggests that Wallachian monastic institutions were able not only to organise and store their land records but also to retrieve and use them as necessary. Besides numerous monastic charters mentioned in the process of dispute resolutions, a Tismana charter describes how one of their charters had been destroyed while it was being carried by a monk to the princely court to be used as evidence in a dispute settlement.16 Furthermore, charters of donations issued by Vlad the Monk and by Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521) to monasteries on Mount Athos specify that princely charters should be brought back to Wallachia to serve as a record when the monks come to collect the dues donated in them. This provides further confirmation that princely archives had not yet been put in place at this time, and that monastic archives were the only institutionally organised locations for the safekeeping of documents.17

13

N. IORGA, Istoria literaturii române în secolul al XVIII-lea [History of Romanian literature during the eighteenth century], 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1901), 1, pp. 20-22. 14 DRH B, 1, No. 46 (1419). 15 Cf. INNES, “Archives, Documents and Landowners in Carolingian Francia”, pp. 157, 170. 16 DRH B, 11, No. 21 (1594). 17 DRH B, 1, No. 231 (1492), and 2, No. 109.

The Evidence

31

In Moldavia as well, originals of Moldavian charters and their dorsal notes point to early document storage in monastic institutions. A charter commissioned by Alexandru the Good (1400-1429) in 1429 on behalf of Neamþ monastery bears a fifteenth-century dorsal note.18 Unfortunately, such contemporary notes are rare occurrences, as few early Moldavian charters survive in their original form. Just one Moldavian charter commissioned on behalf of a monastic institution has been preserved from the fourteenth century.19 Dorsal notes on some fifteenth-century charters suggest that Moldavian secular landowners used monastic archives for the storage of their personal records. For instance, the princely charter issued on behalf of Onicicã in 1427 has a sixteenth-century dorsal note.20 It records the place of the landed estate to whose archive it belongs. In the second half of the nineteenth century, the charter was translated from Slavonic into Romanian and included in a monastic register. We may assume that this boyar’s charter had been stored in the monastic archive where it was indexed, and had been translated and included in a monastic register only later on. Another charter, issued on behalf of Oanã and his wife Anna in 1432, was preserved at Suceviþa monastery up to the nineteenth century, when it was transeferred to the state archives.21 The contemporary dorsal note of this charter records the donated villages but not the name of the beneficiary. A charter from 1497 has two dorsal notes: a contemporary note recording the names of the beneficiaries, and one from the seventeenth century mentioning only the donated village.22 We see that the dorsal notes made on Moldavian boyars’ charters are not consistent.23 They do nevertheless suggest that at least some Moldavian boyars kept their land records in religious institutions. Furthermore, some early fifteenth-century Moldavian charters indicate that boyars’ charters were placed for storage in churches. For instance, in a Moldavian dispute recorded in 1461 it is stated that some laymen’s charters were destroyed while being kept in a church:

18

DRH A,

19

DRH A,

20 21 22 23

1, No. 93 (1429). See also No. 104 (1431). 1, No. 2 (1392). DRH A, 1, No. 66 (1427). DRH A, 1, No. 107 (1432). DRH A, 1, No. 207 (1497). DRH A, 1, No. 197 (1496).

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32

(...) We also had an old title deed issued by prince Alexandru the Old; it was given to our father, Ion Munteanu, Onofrei’s nephew. It was entrusted [for storage] to the Russian priest who was located in the neighbourhood of the town (...). To prove the words of the defenders, the Russian priest coming [to the trial] testified next to other priests that the charter given to Ion Munteanu by prince Alexandru the Old for those three villages was in his hands and it was written by the hand of Bratei. The charter burned together with the front church of the town of Suceava when it was set ablaze by a thunderstorm (...).24

We see that in Moldavia and in Wallachia, as elsewhere, religious institutions were responsible for the first institutional storage of documents. Monastic archives were available to secular landowners from the first half of the fifteenth century. Unfortunately, no details about the particularities of the organisation of monastic archives are specified in the evidence. We see only that charters were not only stored but also retrieved to be used when necessary. Presumably, the content of the charters as summarised in dorsal notes facilitated the charters’ use.25 Later notes also suggest that information was updated, mistakes were corrected, and changes in ownership were recorded. Unfortunately, the evidence about the frequency of laymen’s use of monastic archives is rare. Sadly, in the nineteenth century, when the modern Romanian state archives were founded, the places of provenance of medieval charters were seldom indicated. Consequently, it is sometimes hard to reach a decision as to where individual charters were stored before the founding of the state archives.

Private Storage of Charters The evidence recorded in charters suggests that they were quite often stored in private hands. The details recorded in the procedure for the replacement of lost charters allow us to gain some insight into the methods secular landowners used to store charters. The evidence is rich, yet it can be circumstantial only, as charters preserved in a non-institutional setting are more prone to destruction.26 24

2, No. 100 (1461). Unfortunately the charter is preserved in a late translation. Cf. RADY, Nobility, Land, and Service in medieval Hungary in Medieval Hungary, p. 69. 26 Cf. H. HUMMER, “The production and preservation of documents in Francia: The evidence of cartularies”, in: Documentary Culture and the Laity, pp. 189-230, at p. 102. 25

DRH A,

The Evidence

33

Especially in Moldavia, places used for the storage of written records are repeatedly recorded in the evidence after the mid-fifteenth century.27 During Stephen the Great’s reign many charters were issued as a consequence of charters going missing and requests from secular landowners for their replacement: By God’s grace, we, voievod Stephen, prince of the Moldavian country, make it known with this book of ours, to all those who shall see it, or hear it read, that our true servant Mircea, son of Mihul Orgoaie, came in before our highness and before our boyars and our council, and he complained that the charters of his grandfather, Stephan Orgoaie, which were issued by our grandfather, Alexandru the Old, and by our uncles, princes (voievozi) Ilie and Stephen, when they were in blessed peace, these charters, for the villages of Orgoieºti and Neagomireºti, he had lost them when the Turkish emperor came and despoiled our country. So that we looked with our boyars and our council and we made him a law according to the law of our land, so that he shall bring before us all the neighbours of his lands, so that they may endorse [his claim] and testify that it is in this way. And for this, he raised and he brought before us all his neighbours; they endorsed his claim and testified that it is so (...).28

As can be seen, the specific circumstances in which documents have been lost are mentioned. This gives us an insight into how secular landowners stored their land records, as it is most often boyars who ask for charters to be replaced. The evidence indicates that charters were more often than not stored at home, in the very house of the beneficiary.29 Causes of damage to charters are multiple: political instability, wars against the Ottoman Empire, Tartar raids to loot and capture slaves.30 Not surprisingly, Moldavians fleeing from Tartar looters took their charters with them among their most important valuables: (...) and those books were lost while crossing the river Siret, when Tartars came and spoiled our country; they [Tartars] caught up with them [the fleeing landowners] there and dispossessed them of everything.31

27 Cf. W.C. BROWN “Lay people and documents in the Frankish formula collections”, in: Documentary Culture and the Laity, pp. 125-151, at p. 134. 28 DRH A, 2, No. 230 (1480). 29 Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 155. 30 For the commerce with slaves in the area carried by the Tartars, see Ch. KING, The Black Sea: A History (Oxford, 2004). 31 DIR A, 3, No. 88 (1576).

Chapter 2

34

Fig. 1

Confirmation of the village of Pinteleieºti to a Moldavian noblewoman Muºa, paniþa of pan Pentelei; the former charter was lost when her son died speechless, unable to communicate where the family charter was stored. 11 June, 1464. Bucharest, State Archives, Episcopia Huºi, 38 /1. Photo: Mariana Goina.

However, wars were by no means the only cause of the loss of records. As elsewhere, thieves, fire, and simple accidents regularly appear to be responsible for the destruction of missing records. In 1472 a charter issued during the reign of Stephen the Great records: (...) he testified in front of us [prince Stephen] and in front of all our boyars, great and small, with all his neighbours, that charters he had held from our grandfather, prince Alexandru, and from our uncles, prince Iliaº and prince ªtefan, for that village, Floceºti, on Tazlãul Mare, those charters were burnt in the house of Rusul of Floceºti, when charters of pan Vlaicul, our uncle, were also burnt.32

As appears from this record, charters were not always kept in the actual house of the owners but apparently could also be stored along with other charters in another private house. We may imagine that some specially designed 32

DRH, 2, No. 188 (1472).

The Evidence

35

places for the storage of documents were arranged in some private houses. Yet private houses seem to have been regarded as not very reliable places, as some owners chose to store charters in various unexpected places, burying them in the ground or placing them in hollow trees, with only one family member (or so it seems) knowing where the family charters were preserved.33 For instance, in 1461, (...) the noblewoman Muºa, paniþa of pan Pentelei, mother-in-law of Petrea Oþelescul, along with her daughter Cerna, paniþa of Petru Oþel, testified with all their neighbours, good people, that their charter (...) for the village of Pinteleeºti, that charter of all our above-mentioned ancestors, was lost from the hands of Crîstea, son of Pentelei, when Crîstea fell from his horse and died speechless and about our charter, for our rightful land, was unable to tell where it is.34

The new charter issued on behalf of Muºa and her family comes from a religious institution, which suggests that some laymen placed their records in a religious house when their earlier charters had been lost. The fact that court officials, relatives of the prince, and employees of the princely chancery kept their charters in private settings suggests a reluctance on the part of some secular landowners to make use of monastic archives. In Wallachia, requests for the replacement of lost charters are recorded only at a later date. The procedure is attested a century later than in Moldavia, chiefly from the reign of Mircea Ciobanul (I 1545-1552, II 1553-1554), and becomes more common in the last decades of the sixteenth century.35 Furthermore, it appears that landed estates were re-recorded in writing only in conjunction with a newly purchased estate or as the result of a judicial process, which suggests that in Wallachia the commissioning of charters continued to be rather exceptional.36 From the sparse Wallachian record, lay practices regarding document storage appear to have been similar to those used in Moldavia. Charters could be stored in religious houses but, as in Moldavia, were more often be kept in the homes of their owners, where decay, fire, and theft could lead to their disappearance.37 Land charters were among the most impor 33

DIR A,

34

DRH A,

4, No. 565 (1590). 2, No. 121 (1464). 35 DRH B, 4, No. 291 (1550); DRH B, 5, No. 45 (1555-1557), No. 107 (1557); DRH B, 7, No. 138 (1573). 36 DRH B, 7, No. 143 (1573), No. 203 (1575); DRH B, 11, No. 182 (1596) and No. 262 (1597). 37 The first surviving charter recording a request for the replacement of a written record in

36

Chapter 2

tant possessions to be taken along when their owners had to flee from Tartar or Turk invaders,38 or when they took refuge in neighbouring countries.39 In the richer Moldavian evidence it appears that burying charters in the ground for protection was one of the most common methods employed by secular landowners, at least during periods of war and turmoil. First hinted at in 1557, the practice is often specified in the process of renewal of damaged charters: “(...) the charter of endowment belonging to their grandfather was buried in the ground when Tartars with prince Alexandru pillaged our country; it deteriorated so that only the seal remained untouched”.40 Despite all its disadvantages, this method continued in use after the state archives were established, and apparently well into the mid-twentieth century. During the World War II, Moldavian landowners still ‘protected’ their charters by burying them in the ground.41 Costãchescu, while preparing an edition of the Moldavian charters during the 1930s, photocopied many original fifteenth-century charters that are no longer extant.42 Having been buried during World War II, several centuries-old documents became unusable. The evidence for this custom is rich. For example, the charters of the partition of eleven villages belonging to two Moldavian noblewomen, Marina and Stana, issued in 1493, were buried along with other charters during the World War II and became “completely rotten, only the seal remaining”.43 Another original charter of partition from 1493, already damaged by mice and moles, was photocopied by Costãchescu in 1928; remaining in private hands, this fifteenth-century charter was buried during World War II and was completely destroyed.44 Seemingly, in the early twentieth century the great majority of medieval charters were still in private possession. The editors of medieval Moldavian and Wallachian documents often complained about the reluctance of landown-

Wallachia dates from 1579. DRH B, 8, No. 255 (1579). 38 DRH B, 11, No. 177 and No. 197. 39 DRH B, 8, No. 199 (1579). 40 DIR A, 3, No. 27 (1573). 41 According to a personal communication made by Oana Mateescu, PhD, Ann Arbor University, Michigan, during a field trip she made in 2000 to the Câmpulung region, Romania, her hosts showed her their family charters as a sign of trust; they kept them buried in the ground in their private garden. 42 DRH A, 3, p. 242, note. 43 DRH A, 3, No. 123 (1493) and p. 242, note. 44 DRH, 3 No. 188.

The Evidence

37

ers to allow them to handle their land charters even for the purposes of assessment and photocopying.45 We also see that medieval charters could be deliberately destroyed after modern copies had been secured. A charter of 1497 recording the selling of Bejãricenii village by a subject of Stephen the Great, Vlaicu, son of Scoarþã, to Anuºca and her sisters, Negrita and Maria, was translated in the nineteenth century and was recorded twice, in a monastic and in a village inventory.46 It was also mentioned five times in the numerous court cases brought by the descendants of the three sisters, a community of free villagers from Bejãricenii, during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.47 The modern evidence suggests that the fifteenth-century charter had been preserved in its original form for four centuries. However, it is no longer extant and we may presume that it was destroyed during the modern period. Loss of original medieval documents during the modern period has also been a common fate of fourteenth-century institutional documents. For example, a body of fourteenth-century Wallachian political treaties stored in the Moscow Imperial Archives up to the last years of the nineteenth century vanished thereafter.48 Unfortunately, this is not only a local phenomenon, but quite frequent in the region.49 To summarise, land titles are almost the only type of medieval documents to have survived in the areas that formed medieval Wallachia and Moldavia. The means used to store them were and often remained inadequate up to the twentieth century. With the exception of monastic and urban archives, no source mentions any institutional practice of document storage during the medieval period. Laymen’s charters were kept in private houses or other wholly unsuitable locations, a custom which led to countless instances of the loss of documents not only during the medieval period but well into the twentieth century as well.

45 I. BOGDAN, “Introduction”, in: Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, ed. I. BOGDAN, 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1913), pp. IX-X. See also N. IORGA, “Introduction”, in: Studii ºi Documente cu privire la istoria Românilor [Documents related to Romanian history], ed. N. IORGA, 31 vols. (Bucharest, 1909-1916), 5, p. VI. 46 DRH A, 3, No. 217 (1497). 47 DRH A, 3, p. 387. 48 See, e.g. DHR D Nos. 78 and 115 (Wallachian-Polish political treaties from 1397 and 1411 respectively). 49 For the same fate befalling medieval documents in Serbia, see BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 77.

Chapter 2

38

The Importance of Indirect Evidence In Assessing the Spread of Pragmatic Literacy in Wallachia and Moldavia Despite the steep rise in the number of land records after the mid-sixteenth century, few new types of documents survive. In the last decades of the sixteenth century, we occasionally see securities for debts or records of debts paid.50 It appears that in most cases these records were kept when landed estates were involved as pledges. The absence of new types of surviving documents suggests that there were no changes in the storage practices of the state institutions up to the end of the sixteenth century and beyond.51 Surprisingly, no monastic register of charters compiled up to the seventeenth century survives. While in other states the production of pragmatic documents was significantly influenced by the system of taxation, in Wallachia and Moldavia levies of dues and taxes do not appear in the extant evidence in the period researched.52 Taxes were levied using an oral system of evidence, which was based in the use of tally sticks. However, no secular or even monastic register of dues collected, indeed no account book whatsoever is extant up to the last decade of the sixteenth century. To learn about the system of tax collection or other uses of ephemeral documents we have to rely heavily if not exclusively on indirect evidence. From the mid-fifteenth century, we have references to written registers of dues and taxes being kept. Most early references are to monastic registers. In Moldavia, the first surviving reference to a monastic register dates from the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504). In 1458, this prince required anyone who wished to keep an inn at Baia to register it in the inventory of Moldoviþa monastery.53 In Wallachia, by the end of the fifteenth century, various monastic registers are frequently mentioned as well. For instance, Vlad the Fair announced in 1480 that “(...) the monastic administrators of the customs post shall be free to record in their register everybody who shall refuse to pay [the customs fees] and shall bring him to our highness (...)”.54 Similarly, Radu the Great warns his subjects to obey the holy monastery’s customs employees (va50 51 52 53 54

See for instance DRH A, 8, No. 406 (1590). Cf. M. INNES, “Archives, Documents and Landowners in Carolingian Francia”, p. 183. Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 72. DRH A, 2, No. 75 (1458). DRH B, 1, No. 172 (1480).

The Evidence

39

meºii sfintei mãnãstiri): “(...) and you, office holder, shall not let anybody off for even a coin, since you shall give account according to the monastic register of the custom post of Vadul Dunãrii”.55 After the turn of the sixteenth century, Wallachian princes refer as a matter of course to monastic registers when granting or confirming to monastic institutions control of certain customs posts. For instance, Vladislav III in 1524 confirmed the control of the customs post of Calafat to Tismana monastery and declared that “monks are free to write in their register anybody who fails to pay their fee and bring him to our highness”.56 From the mid-sixteenth century onwards, the number of references to various monastic registers increases. Unfortunately, these registers survive only exceptionally, as, for instance, the property register of Galata monastery.57 Their poor survival is confirmation that monastic institutions kept documents according to their usefulness. Presumably, as elsewhere, monastic registers were discarded after their practical value came to an end. Indirect evidence regarding registers kept by secular institutions comes to light only several generations later. An urban register kept by the Moldavian town of Trotuº is mentioned along with a register kept by the Moldavian treasury department.58 In an administrative letter of 1586, the Moldavian prince asks the tax collectors to check in the register the exact amount of tax levied from a subject who had complained of being unjustly taxed: (...) search the entry of the register in which the levy of those cows is recorded and see whether he is written there and, if so, you shall give him a taller [back] or give him a man for work.59

By the end of the sixteenth century there are references to personal registers kept by noble families. In 1586, a well-to-do Moldavian subject, newly converted to the monastic life, joins with his mother in donating all their family wealth to the monastic institution of Galatia. In his donation charter, the monk Theodor mentions that: 55

DRH B,

56

DRH B,

2, No. 30 (1505). 2, No. 224 (1524). 57 Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea [Romanian documents and notes from the sixteenth century], ed. Gh. CHIVU, M. GEORGESCU, et al. (Bucharest, 1979), No. 72 (1588). 58 DIR A, 2, 3, No. 400 (1586). 59 DIR A, 2, 3, No. 400 (1586).

Chapter 2

40

(...) All our sums unpaid, wherever they shall be found after our death, all shall be collected by the abbey and brothers from Galatia [monastery] according to our register (...).60

In Wallachia, a late monastic cartulary mentions that a register of charters issued by the state chancery was kept during the sixteenth century.61 However, this information is at odds with other sixteenth-century evidence, which indicates that registers of land conveyances were not being kept by the princely administration. The Wallachian prince Pãtraºcu the Good (1554-1557), in the course of resolving a conflict over a landed estate, sent his court official Giura clucer (‘master of the royal household’) to the site of the estate “to check and write down” all the villages along the Jiu river that belonged to the Craioveºti family. He required his official to gather together all the existing charters for the disputed property of that family.62 The letter suggests that registers of charters issued were still not being kept during Pãtraºcu’s reign, or at least that the practice had not become regular. More than a century was needed for the first scattered instances of princely registers to survive. In Wallachia, the earliest instance is a register of the treasury which dates from the reign of Constantin Brâncoveanu (1688-1714).63 More commonly, we can speak of secular registers only from the eighteenth century onwards, as a result of the administrative reforms carried on by the Phanariot princes. Thus, the first register that has come down to us from Moldavia belongs to Grigore Ghica and dates from 1775.64 These administrative reforms of the eighteenth century and requests by Phanariot princes to document the administrative process are perceived as an innovation by the chroniclers.65 This suggests a previous lack of regular use of administrative documents. Additionally, it seems that Wallachian and Moldavian princes and court officials perceived registers and other public documents as their private property: they disappear with each reign.66 This situation resembles what we know 60

DRH A,

61

DRH B,

7, No. 73 (1586). 5, No. 159 (c. 1560-1564). 62 DRH B, 5, No. 85 (1557). 63 “Anatefterul. Condica de porunci a vistieriei lui Constantin Brâncoveanu” [The register of mandates issued from the treasury office of Constantin Brâncoveanu], ed. D.GIURESCU, in: Studii ºi Materiale de Istorie Medie 5 (1962), pp. 353-503 64 Studii ºi documente, ed. N. IORGA, 22, pp.1-45. 65 Letopiseþul Þãrii Moldovei, ed. T. CELAC (Chiºinãu, 1990), p. 469. 66 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, p. XXV.

The Evidence

41

of the early use of documents elsewhere. In England, in the first half of the thirteenth century we see the same picture: documents were treated as personal property.67 A similar pattern of institutional documents being perceived as personal belongings can be traced a century later in Poland.68 However, by the latter half of the thirteenth century in England, and two centuries later in Poland, state institutions were being entrusted with the safekeeping of documents.69 Nothing of this kind can be traced in Wallachia or Moldavia. If we accept the idea that the ‘whole biography’ of a document takes into account three phases, its production, use and storage, the third phase is extremely difficult to pin down in the medieval principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia.70 ***

To sum up, in the medieval principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, while there is a constant growth in the number of surviving charters, almost no other types of pragmatic documents survive from the period researched. Moreover, with the exception of references to urban archives, we have no mention of the regular storage of documents belonging to any secular institutions. This speaks volumes about documentary habits and attitudes toward documents.71 While the main question, whether the scanty record is due to a lack of written practices or to the unsettled storage of documents, must remain open, we may venture to suggest that we are in the presence of an early stage in the use of pragmatic documents. Even if more private documents did once exist, or if more types of documents were used by institutions and private individuals, the lack of any long-term secular document storage system at the level of the state institutions is evidence of as yet immature documentary practices in medieval Wallachia and Moldavia.

67

CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 152. ADAMSKA, “Waging war and making peace with written documents”, in: Strategies of Writing, pp. 253-275, at p. 272. 69 CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 152, ADAMSKA, “Waging war and making peace witw Written documents”, p. 272 and note 30. 70 A. ADAMSKA and M. MOSTERT, “The ‘violent death” of medieval charters: Some observations on the symbolic uses of the documents”, in: Ecclesia, cultura, potestas: Studia z dziejów kultury I spo³eczeñstwa , ed. P. KRAS (Cracow, 2006), pp. 699-709, at p. 700 and note 4. 71 CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 154. 68

Chapter 3

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince ccording to the surviving evidence, princely offices are responsible for the earliest instances of documents produced on the territory of medieval Wallachia and Moldavia. Moreover, up to the turn of the sixteenth century, most of the surviving documents were issued at the princely level. Their types are restricted to charters, treaties, and missives. The first surviving Wallachian document was issued in Latin in 1368, more than three decades after the first ruler of Wallachia, Basarab, founded an autonomous principality by breaking away from Hungarian suzerainty.1 It is a commercial treaty issued by Vladislav I (1364-c.1377) on behalf of traders from Braºov.2 The two other princely documents that survive from the same reign are an administrative letter (1369) informing the Catholic community of Wallachia about the appointment of a Catholic bishop3 and a land charter issued on behalf of a secular landowner.4 The first surviving document produced in the principality of Moldavia is of even later date (1384). It is a charter of endowment on behalf of a Catholic missionary church issued by the Moldavian prince Petru Muºat (c.1375-c.1392) at the request of his mother. The charter is written in Latin.5 Evidence for monastic scribal activity is of a later date; the earliest manuscripts produced in these territories survive only from after the turn of the

A

1

See Chapter 1. DRH D, No. 46 (20 Jan. 1368). Here as elsewhere, I use the princely reigns as published in: Istoria României, ed. Mihai BÃRBULESCU, Dennis DELETANT, et al. 3 DRH B, 1, No. 3 (1369). 4 DRH B, 1, No. 4 (1372, May 8). 5 DRH A, 1, No. 1. 2

Chapter 3

44

fifteenth century.6 Other types of early writing to be found on Wallachian territory are limited to a graffiti dating from 1351 and a funerary inscription of 1364 on the tombstone of the Wallachian Prince Nicolae Alexandru (13521364),7 while from fourteenth-century Moldavia there no other traces of writing are preserved. It appears that early churches and tombstones in Moldavia did not bear any writing. According to ªimanschi and Ignat, funerary inscriptions began to be engraved on Moldavian tombstones only in the first decades of the fifteenth century, during the reign of Alexandru the Good.8 Indirect evidence points to the earlier production of documents both in Moldavia and in Wallachia. An interpolation in a seventeenth-century charter suggests that written land donations were issued in Wallachia earlier than the reign of Vladislav I. A charter of 1618 mentions an endowment of Câmpulung church, made by Nicolae Alexandru (1351-1364), the second Wallachian prince, from whose reign no documents survive.9 The seventeenth-century charter implies that this princely donation was recorded on an icon. It is unclear whether writing materials were not yet available in Wallachia or whether, rather, the recording of this princely endowment on the back of an icon was deliberate, to bestow a special degree of protection on the record and ultimately on the land it involved. In Moldavia, a letter of Pope Gregory XI written to prince Laþcu (c. 1367c. 1375) in 1372 acknowledges that the Pope was addressing the Moldavian prince in response to his written request for papal protection. The letter of prince Laþcu seems to be among the earliest documents to be written on the territory of the Moldavian state. Presumably, the princely letter had been written in Latin.10

6

For more information, see Chapter 4 (section 4.2). The first known Wallachian graffiti, relating to the death of Prince Basarab at Câmpulung on September 1, 1351, were found in the Curtea de Argeº church. See Inscripþii medievale ºi din Epoca modernã a României: Judeþul istoric Argeº (sec. 14-1848) [Medieval and early modern Romanian inscriptions: The historical county of Argeº (fourteenth century to 1848], ed. C. BÃLAN (Bucharest, 1994), p. 53. 8 L. ªIMANSCHI and G. IGNAT, “Constituirea cancelariei statului feudal moldovenesc” [Establishment of the chancellery of the feudal state of Moldavia], Anuarul Institutului de Istorie si Arheologie ‘A.D. Xenopol’ 9 (1972), pp. 107-133, at p. 115. 9 DRH B, 1, No. 2 and note 2. The first Wallachian graffiti mention 1351 as the year of death of the first Wallachian prince, Basarab. Cf. Inscripþii medievale, p. 53. 10 ª. PAPACOSTEA, Moldova începuturilor între latinism ºi slavonism [Early Moldavia between Latin and Slavonic culture] (Bucharest, 2012), p. 8. 7

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

45

Documents in Latin were not to be a lasting pattern either in Wallachia or in Moldavia. Already in 1374, we find Latin being replaced by Slavonic in Wallachia, while in Moldavia the first surviving Slavonic charter dates from 1392.11 However patchy the evidence, we see that princely offices are responsible for the earliest instances of surviving written documents produced on the territories of Wallachia and Moldavia. It appears that the reappearance of written culture there is closely related to the founding of their government apparatuses.

Land Charters The pragmatic documents surviving from the territory of Wallachia and Moldavia are for the most part limited to charters confirming land ownership. Very few of them were produced during the fourteenth century. Almost all the surviving fifteenth-century charters were issued by a single writing office, that of the prince. In the early Moldavian princely office, a variety of traditions were at work, with Polish influence predominating. An organised chancery is considered to have been established in Moldavia during the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432).12 From the same reign onwards we can speak of reasonably regular production of charters in Moldavia. From the long and stable reign of Alexandru the Good two to four charters per year have been preserved. Towards the end of the fifteenth century, the surviving charters double in number. Even if the total of the surviving charters is still low, the number of scribes active in the Moldavian office and the layout of princely diplomas suggest on the one hand a regular activity in this state’s writing office and on the other hand major subsequent losses of charters. Later on, despite frequent political upheavals, the number of charters shows a steady growth (see Table 1).

11 DRH A, 1, No. 2 (1392); Slavonic charters issued in Moldavia, like Wallachian ones, were dated according to Byzantine chronology. As in the case of Wallachia, for reasons of convenience I will use the modern chronology as calculated by the editors of Documenta Romaniae Historica. 12 For more information about the organisation and development of the Moldavian princely chancellery see N. GRÃMADÃ,”Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova pânã la domnia lui Constantin Mavrocordat” [The princely chancery in Moldavia up to the reign of Constantin Mavrocordat], Codrul Cosminului 9 (1935), pp. 131-231, at pp. 131, 137.

Chapter 3

46 Table 1. Moldavian and Wallachian charters – Numbers issued per decade Moldavian charters as compiled in the Documenta Romaniae Historica A Moldova, vols. 1-3, 6-9 and Documente privind Istoria României A, tom 2, vol. 1-4.

Wallachian charters as compiled in Documenta Romaniae Historica B Wallachia, vols. 1-8, vol. 11, and Documente privind istoria României, tom 2, vols. 5-6. 1361-1370

1

1371-1380

2

1384-1390

1

1381-1390

6

1391-1400

11

1391-1400

9

1401-1410

16

1401-1410

11

1411-1420

19

1411-1420

7

1421-1430

53

1421-1430

12

1431-1440

112

1431-1440

20

1441-1450

86

1441-1450

9

1451-1460

89

1451-1460

17

1461-1470

74

1461-1470

18

1471-1480

60

1471-1480

30

1481-1490

116

1481-1490

48

1491-1500

176

1491-1500

76

1501-1510

89

1501-1510

81

1511-1520

177

1511-1520

123

1521-1530

137

1521-1530

152

1531-1540

72

1531-1540

211

1541-1550

182

1541-1550

196

1551-1560

226

1551-1560

219

1561-1570

172

1561-1570

71

1571-1580

346

1571-1580

591

1581-1590

662

1581-1590

497

1591-1600

620

1591-1600

536

Total

3,496

Total

2,943

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

47

In Wallachia, both the organisation of the princely chancery and the standardisation of charter forms seem to have occurred at a later date. There is no process of linear evolution, but we rather observe rather ebbs and flows which make it somewhat difficult to decide when exactly the Wallachian chancery established its routines. Damian considers that this took place during the reign of Mircea the Old.13 However, I have not been able to see any standardisation of charters as early as that. It is only after the turn of the sixteenth century that Wallachian charters become generally predictable in their layout. The Moldavian princely office thus seems to have made a better start, despite the later foundation of its state institutions. For the first half of the fifteenth century, the number of surviving Wallachian princely diplomas continues to be very low. Only in the reign of Radu the Fair (I (1462-14673), II (1473-1474), III (14741475)) do we see a slight increase in the number of surviving charters. Considerably later, the last quarter of the sixteenth century marks a steep rise in the number of surviving charters. By the end of the reign of Michael the Brave (1593-1601), the number of extant Wallachian charters has increased by a factor of more than ten and is almost comparable to the number of surviving Moldavian charters (see Table 1). Wallachian and Moldavian charters, with a very few early exceptions, were written in Slavonic, the official language of Church and State in the medieval Wallachian and Moldavian principalities. In Wallachia, early formal princely documents such as charters, diplomas, and commercial and political treaties, were referred to as hrisov (Slavonic hrisobul), a term of Byzantine origin (khrusobullion, bulla aurea); this term presumably reached Wallachia via Bulgaria and Serbia.14 Princely writs were called orizmo and poveleanie, the former term of Byzantine, the latter of Slavonic origin, both meaning ‘decision’ and, later on, ‘order’.15 These two terms 13

For more information about the Wallachian chancery during the reign of Mircea the Old, see D.P. BOGDAN, “Cancelaria lui Mircea cel Mare” [The chancery of Mircea the Great] Revista de Istorie 39.7 (1986), pp. 659-669; for the formation and function of the Wallachian princely chancery, see ID., “Diplomatica slavo-românã din secolele 14 ºi 15” [Slavonic-Romanian diplomatics of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries], Revista istoricã românã 1.5-6 (1935-6), pp. 268-299, at p. 253; Ibid. 2. 8 (1938), pp. 95-123, at p. 111; Ibid. 4 (1934), pp. 92-140; Ibid. 7 (1937), pp. 74-121; Ibid. 8 (1938), pp. 95-123. 14 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, ed. I. BOGDAN, p. XXIII; BOGDAN, “Diplomatica slavo-românã din secolele XIV ºi XV”, Revista istoricã românã 5-6, pp. 240-241; For Serbia, see BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 56; for the charters issued during the period see, e.g. DRH B, 1, No. 21 (c. 1400-1403), No. 28 (c. 1404-1406). 15 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, ed. I. BOGDAN, p. XXIII.

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can both be encountered with reference to the same document. After the midfifteenth century, all three terms mentioned are used interchangeably for all types of princely documents: for charters, treaties, and even for letters.16 Hrisov continued to be used for princely diplomas but is only rarely encountered. The term was reserved for the most solemn ones.17 The usual term used to refer to a charter in the promulgation formula is poveleanie (‘order’, ‘mandate’). In Moldavia, princely charters as well as diplomatic treaties issued in Slavonic, were called list (‘sheet’), a term borrowed from the chancery of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.18 In the medieval evidence, any written document can be referred to by a generic name: kniga (‘book’). This word refers not to the content of a particular type of written document but to its materiality as an object.19 Its meaning covers all written documents: a diplomatic treaty, a princely diploma or a deed, even a letter.

The Wording and Layout of Princely Charters Script, language, and layout of the earliest Moldavian and Wallachian charters testify to well-trained professionals employed in the early princely offices. As the names of early scribes of the princely chanceries indicate that they were of foreign origin (Polish and Ruthenian scribes in Moldavia, and perhaps Bulgarian ones in Wallachia),20 I assume that they brought a developed tradition of charter writing with them from their home countries. Presumably, given that the founding of the two states occurred at such a late date, mature practices of drafting charters were borrowed unaltered from neighbouring countries.

16

DRH B, 1, No. 128 (1465), No. 130 (1466); Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 74 (1476); for letters, see ibid., No. 73 (c. 1456-1462). 17 DRH B, 1, 212 (1488), No. 244 (1493); DRH B, 8, No. 189 (1579). 18 D.P. BOGDAN, “Contribuþii la studiul diplomaticei vechi moldoveneºti”, Revista istoricã românã 4 (1934), p. 95 and note 3. For the evidence recorded in contemporary documents, charters and treaties alike, see Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, ed. M. COSTÃCHESCU, 2 vols. (Iaºi, 1932), 2, No. 11 (1439) and No. 171 (1402); Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, ed. I. BOGDAN, 2 vols, (Bucharest, 1913), 2, No. 15 (1494) and No. 116 (1503). 19 Cf. Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, ed. CHIVU et al., No. 29. 20 For more details about early professional literates employed in the Wallachian and Moldavian princely chanceries, see Chapter 5.

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

Fig. 2

49

Prince Roman donates three villages to his servant Ioan㺠viteaz. Oldest surviving Moldavian Slavonic charter. 30 March 1392 (6900). Bucharest, National Archives-C, Colecþia Peceþi, no. 111. Photo: Mariana Goina.

Early Wallachian and Moldavian Slavonic charters testify to a fusion of Western and Eastern influences. In Wallachia, we may trace Byzantine influence filtered through South Slavonic culture, Bulgarian in the early period and Serbian later.21 Hungarian influence is likewise visible in the early Wallachian charters. According to Grãmadã, the Moldavian princely charter was shaped by Polish royal charters written in Slavonic.22 Conversely, Damian Bogdan argues that some elements of the Moldavian early charters show evidence of an early South Slavonic influence.23 It appears that Western elements reached the Moldavian princely office through the Slavonic offices of Poland and Lithuania, 21 D. IONESCU, “Contribution à la recherche des influences byzantines dans la diplomatique roumaine”, Revue historique du Sud-est européen 11 (1934), pp. 6-13. 22 For more information, see GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, pp. 134-135. 23 D.P. BOGDAN “Contributii la studiul diplomaticii vechi moldovenesti”, Revista istoricã românã 4 (1934), pp. 92-140.

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while Byzantine and South Slavonic characteristics came via Wallachia.24 For example, the Byzantine-influenced intitulatio of prince Roman I (1392-1394), as recorded in the first extant Moldavian charter, is replaced by one showing Western influence in the following charters. Gradually, new textual elements such as proclamation, narration, and sanctions are added to Moldavian charters. In the first extant Moldavian charter issued under prince Roman I no proclamation is included as yet.25 The proclamation “to all that shall see and read” was to appear in the following charters of prince Roman and it became a common textual feature of Moldavian charters.26 Some Moldavian textual elements, such as the boundary clause, the dating clause according to feast days, and the proclamatio, are significantly different from the Wallachian formulary and provide evidence of a more pregnant Western influence. A recurrent common feature of the early Moldavian charters is the degree of emphasis placed on the business section at the expense of religious elements. Records are short and practically oriented; religious preambles and sanctions are seldom employed and usually occur only in charters secured by religious institutions. For instance, no proem or sanctions are included in the first Slavonic charter, commissioned by Roman I (1392-1394), while the disposition and boundary clause is recorded in detail next to the list of witnesses.27 Spiritual sanctions are recorded for the first time in Iuga’s charter of 1399. Moldavian scribes, like their Wallachian counterparts, counted the years in the Byzantine and Slavonic manner, i.e. from the creation of the world. Scribes use the Julian calendar and sporadically refer to feast days as well. A dating clause is almost always recorded in the early Moldavian charters. Only exceptionally is the date omitted or only partially recorded. During the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432), we witness a process of standardisation of the layout of Moldavian charters. Grãmadã believes that the features of the Moldavian princely charter were fully formed by 1407.28 Its layout usually included a symbolic or verbal invocation, an intitulation coupled with a devotion formula, publication, narration, disposition, boundary clause, witness list, prohibition, and corroboration. On occasion we encounter other textual features such as sanctions, usually in charters granted to religious insti24

GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, p. 133; M. LASCARIS Influences byzantines dans la diplomatique bulgare, serbe et slavo-roumaine (Prague, 1931), p. 4. 25 DRH A, 1, No. 2 (1392). 26 DRH A, 1, No. 4 (1393). 27 DRH A, 1, No. 2 (1392). 28 GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, p. 132.

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

51

tutions. However, in most charters, the disposition, boundary clause, and witness lists remained the dominant features, with the witness list generally including over twenty names, normally those of court officials with their sons and (sometimes) brothers. Fifteenth-century Moldavian princely charters were invariably written on parchment and sealed with pendant princely seals: With the grace of God, we, prince Alexandru, prince of the Moldavian country. With this charter, we let all, who shall see it, or hear it read, know, that this true Baºotã Manuil with his good will, without any force or pressure came before our highness and gave a village, his property, namely Bãºotenii, to the Neamþ monastery of Christ’s Resurrection, to be in their ownership with all its income for ever, never touched. And the boundaries of that village shall be according to the old boundary, as they used it from ever. And this is my princely true belief, of the above-written prince Alexandru, and the belief of my princely son, prince Iliaº, and belief of my princely sons, Steþco and Petru and the belief of all the children of our princely highness, and all the boyars of our princely highness, belief of pan Mikhail and his sons, belief of pan Negru, belief of pan Vîlcea and his children, belief of pan Iliaº and his children, belief of pan Giurgiu and his children, belief of pan Cubcici palatine and his children, belief of pan Isaia and his children, belief of pan Nesteac and his children, belief of pan Giurgea of Jumãtate and his brothers and their children, belief of pan Dan and his children, belief of pan Bratu, the brother of the queen (cneaghina), and his children, belief of pan Stan and his children, belief of pan Neagoe, chancellor, belief of pan Negrilã cup-bearer (ceaºnic), belief of pan Costici, chamberlain, belief of pan Opriº and his children, belief of pan Uncheat and his children, belief of pan Ciurbã and his children, belief of pan ªtibur and his children, belief of pan Damacu seneschal (stolnic) and his children and belief of all our boyars high and low. And after our life, who shall be the prince of our country, from our children, or from our kin, or whom God shall choose as prince, he shall not touch our endowment, but strengthen it. And if somebody shall remove our gift, God and his truly innocent mother shall punish him. And for a stronger enforcement of all written above, we commanded our servant, scribe Mikhail, to write and to affix our seal on this book of ours. In Suceava, in the year of 6936 (1428), 4 December.29

In Wallachia, a conventional layout of charters can be traced from an early period too. Among the textual elements usually included we find a symbolic invocation, a superscription often linked with the formula of divine invocation, preamble, narration, disposition, prohibition, followed by spiritual sanctions, 29

DRH A,

1, No. 80.

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52

witness list, corroboration, and subscription. This pattern is attested for the first time during the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418) and continues to be used in princely charters throughout the fifteenth century.30 In early Wallachian charters there is a balance between legal and religious elements. Generally, particular attention is paid to the dispositive clause, the so-called ‘business’ section of charters.31 As early as the reign of Mircea the Old, special emphasis began to be put on religious proems. As we have observed, the layout of fifteenth-century charters does not as yet conform to a stereotype; the emphasis placed on a particular textual element may differ from one charter to the next. Certain legal elements, as for instance witness lists, the boundary clause, and other legal details, can be completely omitted from Wallachian monastic records, while moral and religious statements are elaborated upon at length. The dating clause is also very unsystematic in the early Wallachian charters. Out of sixteen original charters preserved from the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418), only seven charters record the complete date: year, month, and day. A peculiarity of the dating of these early charters is the practice of referring to a recent event alongside or instead of the regular date: “[the charter was written] (...) when the prince was travelling to Snagov to meet the king”,32 or “(...) when the mother of the prince [Mircea the Old] came to visit him from the Hungarian parts”.33 The scribe Mikhail, who uses this way of dating, is regarded as well trained, yet even for him particular events that occurred in his days are more memorable than an abstract date.34 As Michael Clanchy observes, it was more difficult to refer to a dry chronological order than to a recent event.35 Religious proems began to be emphasised especially in solemn charters issued on behalf of monastic institutions: Following the Holy God’s Gospels which state, “I want charity not sacrifice” and again “Through charities our sins are cleansed” and again “Happy the charity givers since they shall be saved”. Also the blessed mouth utters: “Bless the man who gives charity and every day partakes himself with God”. And as we knew these from the Holy Gospels, we again heard the Holy Spirit uttering: “You, emperors, 30 31 32 33 34 35

BOGDAN “Diplomatica slavo-românã din secolele XIV ºi XV”, 5-6 (1935-1936), p. 254. 1, No. 6 (undated); dated by modern editors to 1374. DRH B, 1, No. 32 (1406). DRH B, 1, No. 42 (1418). See D. BOGDAN, “Cancelaria lui Mircea”, p. 665. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 303. DRH B,

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

53

shall hear, comprehend and realise; you, judges of the heads of mankind, you, masters of the crowds, and those who praise themselves in the mastery of mankind, you [shall understand] that your power comes from God, your supremacy from Him”. Understanding that we all are in God’s hands, who, according to His wish, gives to all of us, so happy and blessed, three times happy the one who spends well the wealth given by God and who secretly multiplies what God gave him, so that he can hear that good and sweet voice of happiness: “You, the good and faithful servant, partake of the joy of your Master”. Hearing these, we shall strive to be as our well-intended and honest forerunners, who mastered well the earthly tasks and mastering them well were able to get hold of heavenly goods; they could inherit [safeguard] those, while the earthly one they have left on the earth. And I, through God Christ, well truthful and faithful and devoted, I alone, master and prince Radu, son of the grand prince Radu, we who, through God’s grace and through our prayers, are the prince of the entire country of Wallachia; I, inspired by God, together with our God-given children and with my Lady, Cãtãlina, and with my brothers Mircea, Vladul, and Vlad raised my wish towards the holy, godly churches according to the words of the prophet: “As a stag strives to reach the water springs, my soul strives towards you, O God”. Seeing that our sins caused that the number of blessed princes, who built, embellished, and endowed holy and blessed churches, especially those found in this holy place, the holy and blessed church of our Holy and Immaculate and Blessed Mistress, Mother of God and Eternal Virgin Mary, and her holy, blessed place, the monastery named Govora. I have seen it abandoned by its most honourable princes and happy founders, our grandfathers and great-grandfathers until it remained in charge of the above-named, Io Prince Radul and his Lady Cãtãlina, and their blessed by God children and brothers, Mircea and Vlad; this holy monastery we were reluctant to abandon, instead we were desirous to take care of it, to endow and to embellish it, so [that we could be] called its last founders. For that, we raised our wish toward the holy monastery, after our blessed and holy forerunners the above-named grandfathers and great-grandfathers happily passed away. For this, we pledge, and make this charter of ours so that it can stand untouched, that as much as we can we shall strive to endow the holy monastery each year with 3,000 silver coins. And we also endowed it with villages so that the holy monastery can master them, namely the entire village of Stoicianii on Olt with its entire border; because I had bought it from Vlaicul, brother of Albul, for 10,000 silver coins [aspri];36 other villages that I had bought, half of Stolniceani on Olt, [bought] from Brat, son of Lal, for 5000 silver coins and in Curtiºoru on Olt, above Slatina, the entire share of Stanislav, because I had bought it from scribe (grãmã36

For the value of aspru, the Turkish silver coin, see N. IORGA, Documente nouã în mare parte româneºti relative la Petru chiopul ºi Mihai Viteazul [New Romanian documents concerning Petru ªchiopul and Mihai Viteazul] (Bucharest, 1898), p. 6.

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tic) Corlat; and with all these, I have endowed the holy monastery, so that it shall be of use to the holy monastery and to godly monks for provisions, and to us and to our parents, and children, and brothers, it shall serve as an eternal remembrance. For this, all I have named, all that I could [bestow] according to my might, along with these villages, our gift shall be given to our monastery as it is written above and we have left it to our sons and to our brothers as long as we shall remain alive and as long as God shall allow us to keep what he has entrusted to us. And after our death, our sons and brothers, as long as God shall keep them alive and in their parents’ and grandparents’ possession given by God they shall continue, they shall behave as I have instructed, and shall observe and enforce this charter; they, as well as all those that God shall choose to be masters of the above-named [country], all of them shall be honoured and protected and strengthened by God. And who shall observe these donations, God shall bestow on him to master the earthly riches in peace, and he shall inherit celestial blessing and he shall stand on His right side; which shall be bestowed also on us, sinners, together with the former holy founders, to inherit through prayers of our blessed and immaculate Mistress, Mother of God, and eternal Virgin Mary, and her blessed place, [through the prayers] of holy and blessed fathers, holy saints, who from the time without end were dear to God and to honourable monks who strove for and served the holy monastery and passed away in peace; and to all of our time and to all who shall be afterwards, as long as our holy monastery shall endure. I have written in the month of March, 23 days, during Lent on the Wednesday of Holy Week, in the royal capital (cetatea de scaun) Târgoviºte, in the year 7005 (1497). Io, Prince Radul, with the Grace of God, prince.37

This charter was commissioned by Radu the Great in the last years of the fifteenth century and is preserved in its original form. After the turn of the sixteenth century, lengthy religious charters become increasingly rare. Particularly in charters commissioned by secular landowners, we begin to notice a gradual switch to emphasis on the business part at the expense of religious elements.38 Apparently the increase in the use of charters triggered changes in terms of their being perceived as potential legal instruments. Even in certain charters issued on behalf of monastic institutions the emphasis is placed on the business part, on the disposition, boundary clause, and witness list.39 In most cases, business-oriented charters of this type record protracted disputes between monastic institutions and village communities. In 37

B,

DRH B, 1, No. 273 (1497). The original is preserved at Govora monastery. See also DRH 1, No. 53 (1424) and No. 279 (1497). 38 See for instance DRH B, 2, No. 21 (1503) and No. 31 (1505). 39 DRH B, 5, No. 239 (1562).

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

55

charters that confirmed disputed estates, monastic institutions favoured practical legal information over religious sanctions. In sixteenth-century charters, religious sanctions were often left out completely: By God’s grace, prince Radu, master of the entire country of Wallachia, son of good and high prince Vlad. Our highness gives this order to priest Francu and his sons, jupan Tudor, scribe, and jupan Stanciul and to their sons, our highness’s servants, so that they shall hold at Voineºti the entire share of Petre, all that is his share from the plain, and from the woods, and from the water, because they bought it from Petre for 1,400 silver coins. And again they shall master all the share of Sibiºtean, the entire part of plain and water and from the woods half, because they have bought it from Sibiºtean for 1,400 silver coins. And again they shall master from Dumitru and his grandson Radu a quarter of their share, a quarter from the plain, woods, and water, because they have bought it from Dumitru and his grandson for 1,400 silver coins. And again from those three parts that remained in the possession of Dumitru and Radu, they shall keep nine fields because they have bought them from Dumitru and Radu for 400 silver coins. And they shall master the entire pond and four fields of Paul, because they have bought them from Paul for (...) silver coins. And priest Frâncu and his sons paid 350 silver coins, before town officials (pârgari) from Râmnic. And they have given a horse to our highness. And because of this our highness gave them those [estates] so that they master them followed by their sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons, for ever and by nobody touched, according to our highness’s utterance. Witnesses are: jupan Barbul, and jupan Pârvul Craioveºti, jupan Badea from Cojeºti, jupan Stroe grand palatine (mare vornic), jupan Bogdan chancellor (logofãt), Pârvul master of the horse (comis), Calotã treasurer (vistiernic), Danciul sword bearer (spãtar), Badea cup bearer (paharnic), Izvoranul seneschal (stolnic), Neagoe chamberlain (postelnic). And I, scribe Dragomir wrote in the princely town Târgoviºte, April month, 12 days, in the year 7014 [1506]. Io, prince Radu, prince by God’s grace.40

We can see in fifteenth-century Wallachian charters that the emphasis on certain textual elements seems to vary according to the charter’s commissioners, as religious preambles are a more important feature of charters issued on behalf of monastic institutions. After the turn of the sixteenth century, presumably a higher demand for written records brought about changes in the layout of charters. We can also assume that changes took place in the direction of the 40 DRH B, 2, No. 42. The original, written on paper, is preserved in the Bucharest State Archives, Episcopia Râmnic collection, No. 52.2.

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perception of charters as legal instruments, as the business part of charters became the most emphasised element. After the first quarter of the sixteenth century, chiefly from the second reign of Petru Rareº (1541-1546) onwards in Moldavia, and in Wallachia as well, further changes in the practices of the princely chanceries may be observed. In Moldavia, besides the solemn charters that usually continue to follow the conventional layout of the fifteenth-century charter, written on parchment and sealed with princely pendant seals, a new type of records began to be produced. This second type is a schematic charter called ispisoc (‘written note’, ‘notitia’); it puts great emphasis on the business section: Prince Stephen, by the grace of God prince of Moldavia, I gave to our servants Anton and Pletea, son of Fedea, a quarter of the whole of Glodeni village, which they have bought from Ion Gherasim for 120 Tartar golden coins. And our servants Anton and Pletea son of Fedea paid all this money above-written into the hands of Ion Gherasim, before us, at Iaºi. And nobody shall interfere with this book of ours. Written at Iaºi in the year 7060 [1552], 14 February.41

From the same period, paper, which had come into general use in Europe during the fifteenth century, began also to be employed in the medieval Romanian principalities. In Wallachia it was used chiefly from the reign of Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521) onwards. In Moldavia it began to be used sporadically several decades later.42 The practice was for paper to be used for notes and the new type of schematic records, as well as for princely writs, while solemn charters continued to be written on parchment. Commissioners of princely land records had to purchase from the chancery the material on which their record was to be written and to pay for its production; presumably, landowners purchased those materials within their means. After the mid-sixteenth century, paper became widely used in the two chanceries, with parchment becoming somewhat exceptional.43 Gradually, paper began to be employed even for charters confirming monastic endowments and for land purchases made by high court officials.44 By the last decades of the sixteenth century, parchment occurs only in exceptional circum-

41 42 43 44

See, e.g. DRH A, 6, No 73 (1552). DIR A, 1, No. 349 (1536), No. 366 (1541), and No. 369 (1542). DRH A, 7, No. 102 (1575); for Wallachia DRH B, 8, No. 303 (1580). DRH B, 2, No. 179 (1519) and No. 180 (1519).

Documents Issued by the Office of the Prince

57

stances.45 Michael the Brave, for example, still used parchment to record his own landed estates and endowments on behalf of his mother.46 Even if it is clear that the new schematic records could be written on behalf of a variety of landowners, a note at the end of these records stipulating that “a princely diploma shall be issued [later on]” raises questions about the status and function of these new records.47 Pungã believed that the schematic records on paper only had short-term legal value; they were produced only as a consequence of the temporary absence from the chanceries of the chancellors whose validation of charters was mandatory.48 None of these schematic records has a surviving corresponding solemn princely diploma. Conversely, from the same period we do have solemn princely diplomas recording other landed estates. These were issued on behalf of monastic institutions or the highest court officials and are very lengthy, recording a detailed description of estate boundaries and other practical details along with an extensive (religious) proem and spiritual sanctions.49 We may deduce that the layout of charters, as well as the material on which they were written, depended on the status of those commissioning them. Variations in the layout of princely charters may point on the one hand to a higher demand for written records, while on the other it may be a sign of economic and social differences between the commissioners of written records. Only the most powerful could ask for their landed estates to be recorded in solemn princely charters written on parchment. To sum up, in the medieval Romanian principalities charters are the earliest types of surviving documents. As Jack Goody observed: “of all the legal procedures that writing affects, the changes involved in the tenure of land, by the registration of title are some of the most far-reaching for society as a whole”.50 Their number increases steadily over time, but until the turn of the sixteenth century almost all charters that have survived were issued at the princely level. The differences between the layout of early Wallachian and Moldavian charters testify to the distinct writing traditions that shaped the Moldavian and 45

DRH A,

46

DRH B,

9, No. 317 (1598) and No. 339 (1598). 11, No. 314 (1598). 47 DRH A, 6, No. 5 (1552). 48 Gh. PUNGÃ, “De ce lipsesc uricele pentru unele perioade din cancelaria Moldovei?” [Why are Moldavian charters missing in certain periods?] in: Studii de istorie medievalã ºtiinþe auxiliare (Iaºi, 1999), p. 12. 49 DRH A, 6, No. 438 (1570). 50 GOODY, Logic of Writing, p. 154.

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Wallachian princely chanceries. The early professionals who were active in the princely chanceries had been trained in different cultural milieus. As a consequence, they brought to Moldavia and Wallachia distinct written practices from their countries of origin. In addition, we can trace a link between the commissioners of charters and charter layout, particularly in Wallachia, where in the early monastic charters religious elements are very strongly emphasised. Conversely, Moldavian charters placed a special emphasis on the business part. Gradually, along with an increase in the number of charters, a greater degree of schematisation may be observed, especially in Moldavia. The developments in the chanceries and the introduction of the use of paper may have accounted for and have been influenced by the rise in the demand for written records. The layout of charters can therefore offer additional evidence regarding the spread of written records and their perception. During the fifteenth century, when Wallachian charters are particularly few in number, we see an emphasis on religious elements, whereas later, particularly after the turn of the sixteenth century, legal information began to acquire prominence, suggesting a change in the perception of written land records. In Moldavia this phenomenon is visible from the fifteenth century; the acquaintance of the Moldavian boyars with written land records is emphasised by the higher number of surviving charters commissioned by laymen, by the layout of these charters, and by the earlier development of a more schematic, legally-oriented land record.

Political and Commercial Treaties Aside from charters, diplomatic and commercial treaties are among the few early surviving types of pragmatic documents issued by the Wallachian and Moldavian princes. They help us trace foreign influence on the birth and development of written culture in the Wallachian and Moldavian territories, as many early commercial treaties specify that they were issued at the request of foreign political entities, mostly the Hungarian and Polish kings.51

51

See, e.g. DRH D, No. 46 (20 Jan 1368).

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Political Treaties The number of extant Moldavian and Wallachian political treaties is particularly low. Most were signed with the kings of Poland and Hungary. Written peace agreements with the Ottoman Empire are no longer extant, although there is strong evidence that they did exist.52 Few as they are, for the fourteenth century, political treaties form a significant part of the surviving body of evidence. For the study of early medieval written culture, the value of these treaties lies in the fact that they are among the earliest surviving documents produced in the Danubian Principalities and as such show the context in which Moldavian and Wallachian institutions came into contact with foreign practices of document production.53 We can see that diplomacy was among the earliest kinds of business to trigger the production of pragmatic documents. It would seem that early written agreements were produced at the request of foreign powers and that some were even written by foreign scribes.54 In Moldavia, up to the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432) nine surviving political treaties acknowledge the overlordship of King Ladislas II of Poland (c.1352/1362-1434) and record political agreements of the Moldavian princes with the kingdom of Poland.55 This number is comparable to that of the surviving charters from the period. We see that during the early period of the Moldavian state external agreements made up a significant proportion of the extant documents: out of 78 Moldavian pragmatic documents preserved for the period up to the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504), 36 are political treaties and agreements signed between Moldavian princes or claimants to the throne and neighbouring powers, particularly Poland.56 The abundance of early Moldavian political treaties and agreements may be a consequence of the polit52

V. PANAITE, Pace, rãzboi ºi comerþ în Islam: Þãrile Române ºi dreptul otoman al popoarelor [War, peace and trade in Islam: The Romanian lands and the Ottoman Law of Nations] (Iaºi, 2013), pp. 306-309. 53 Cf. S. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in early Rus, pp. 164-166. 54 D. CIUREA “Diplomatica latinã în þãrile române: Noi contribuþii” [Latin diplomatics in the medieval Romanian principalities: New contributions], Anuarul institutului de istorie ºi arheologie 8 (1971), pp. 1-27, at p. 3. 55 Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 162 (1387), No. 163 (1387), No. 165 (1393), No. 166 (1395), No. 167 (1395), and No. 170 (1400). 56 For the edited documents, see Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, Nos. 162-235. Three treaties are known from the Polish indirect evidence: Documente privitoare la istoria Românilor, 1.2, No. 578 (1442), No. 593 (714), and No. 609 (1447).

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ical instability of the early Moldavian state. During the unsettled periods that preceded and followed the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432), each prince was eager to acquire or secure his political power through agreements with neighbouring states. Later on, only those princes who played an important role in the regional balance of power, such as Stephen the Great (1457-1504) and Petru Rareº (I 1527-1538, II 1541-1546), concluded treaties of alliance with this frequency. From the reign of Stephen the Great, for instance, seven treaties signed with Polish kings and Lithuanian princes are extant.57 After the first reign of Petru Rareº, as the political power of the Moldavian princes diminished and the influence of the Ottoman Empire grew stronger in Moldavia, the number of political agreements signed with Western powers decreased. From the period between the second reign of Petru Rareº (1541-1546) and the first reign of Ieremia Movilã (1595-1600) only five treaties signed by Moldavian princes with kings of Poland and one with the Transylvanian prince John Zapolya survive. The surviving Wallachian treaties are insignificant in number throughout the period studied. From the fifteenth century only five treaties have come down to us. The largest number date from the reign of Mircea the Old (13861418). The first of these treaties, dating from 1389,58 like the subsequent three was basically a bilateral agreement with the king of Poland against Sigismund of Hungary.59 Other treaties entered into by the early Wallachian state are signalled by indirect evidence. From time to time, as vassals of the king of Hungary, Wallachian princes concluded peace treaties with the urban administration of the town of Braºov and with the county of Bistriþa.60 From the sixteenth century we have three other Wallachian treaties, two signed by Radu the Great (1495-1508) and one by Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521).61 The small num57

Five of these treaties were signed with the Polish king Cazimir. See, e.g. Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 129 (2 March 1462), No. 135 (July 28, 1468), No. 178 (12 July, 1499), and No. 179 (14 Sept., 1499). 58 Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 1.2, No. 258 (1389). 59 DRH D, No. 79 (1391) and No. 115 (1411). 60 DRH D, No. 133 (1421) and No. 338 (1456). 61 Documente privitoare la istoria românilor, ed. E. HURMUZACHI, N. DENSUªEANU, N. IORGA, et al., 19 vols. in 31 parts and 2 Supplements in 9 parts (Bucharest, 1887-1937) [henceforth Documente Hurmuzachi], 2. 1, No. 210 (7 January 1543); Acte ºi scrisori din arhivele oraºelor ardelene (Bistriþa, Braºov, Sibiu), in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1 (1358-1600), ed. N. IORGA (Bucharest, 1911), 15.1, No. 327 (3 Dec., 1507); Documente ºi regeste privitoare la relaþiile Þãrii Rumâneºti cu Braºovul ºi Ungaria în sec. XV si XVI [Documents and summaries concerning the Wallachian relations with Braºov and Hungary during the fifteenth and the sixteenth centuries)], ed. I. BOGDAN (Bucharest, 1902), No. 153 (17 March 1517).

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ber of surviving political treaties indicates that the Wallachian state enjoyed a relatively short period of political independence. As the early treaties were not kept distinctly in archives or other storage facilities, their diminishing number after the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418) may suggest a weakening of the state of Wallachia, which now acted mainly as a vassal province, undertaking political agreements at an inferior level, chiefly with the urban administrations of towns in Transylvania.

Commercial Treaties and Regulations The majority of surviving commercial agreements were concluded with the kingdom of Poland and with Transylvanian commercial towns. Written trade regulations with the Ottoman Empire are not preserved, and Panaite therefore considers that Danubian trade was carried out under customary law.62 The earliest commercial treaties date from the first half of the fifteenth century, when the extant documents are particularly few. This signals that trade was a salient factor in the birth and development of written culture. Especially in Wallachia, trade appears as one of the main activities that triggered the production of pragmatic documents. This body of evidence prominently shows the influence of foreign written practices on the birth of pragmatic literacy in Wallachia. For instance, the first extant Wallachian document, a commercial treaty, mentions that it was issued at the request of a Hungarian court official who was sent to Wallachia by the king to confirm in writing “the eternal peace agreements” and the rights of the Braºov traders on the territory of Wallachia.63 Wallachian commercial treaties thus stand out as yet another body of evidence that helps us to trace foreign influences on the assimilation of written practices. In Moldavia, too, during the first half of the fifteenth century princes quite frequently issued written commercial agreements on behalf of Polish and Transylvanian merchants. The importance of this body of evidence is enhanced by the fact that many commercial treaties issued by the Wallachian and Moldavian princes have survived in their original form, most of them in the rich collection of the Braºov town archives. Let us pause to consider the issue of the importance of commercial activities for the development of written culture in Wallachia and Moldavia a mo62 63

PANAITE, Pace, rãzboi, ºi comerþ în Islam, pp. 398-399. No. 46 (20 Jan1368).

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ment longer. The theme of the significance of trade has a long history in Romanian historiography. Iorga (in 1924) and later Papacostea (in 1999), among many others, saw the existence of the international trade routes that crossed the Wallachian and Moldavian principalities as one of the causes that led to the foundation of the Romanian state.64 More recently, Rãdvan has emphasised trade as a key factor of urban development in the medieval Romanian principalities.65 In my reading of the data, international trade exchanges also brought about the production and use of pragmatic documents, especially in Wallachia. The main towns dominating the commercial exchanges between the kingdom of Hungary and the medieval principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia were the Transylvanian commercial burgs of Braºov (Kronstadt), Sibiu (Hermannstadt) and, later on, Bistriþa (Bistritz), populated mainly by Germanspeaking Saxon settlers brought to Hungary by King Géza II (1141-1162).66 Perhaps due to its location, Braºov became one of the main centres of redistribution for oriental products.67 The many commercial treaties issued on behalf of Braºov traders by the Hungarian kings Louis of Anjou (1342-1384) and Sigismund I of Luxemburg (1387-1437) emphasise their crucial role as international trade agents. Most of the surviving early Wallachian commercial treaties were also granted to the town of Braºov.68 The first surviving one, produced by Vladislav I for the Braºov traders on 2 June 1368, is also the first surviving Wallachian document.69 The frequency with which commercial privileges were bestowed up until the reign of Vlad Dracul (1436-1442, 1443-1447) is noteworthy: almost every new prince repeatedly reaffirmed in writing the commercial rights granted by his predecessors.70 All through the period under consider64 N. IORGA, Drumurile de comerþ creatoare ale statului românesc [Commercial routes as founders of the Romanian state] (Bucharest, 1924); ª. PAPACOSTEA, “Începuturile politicii comerciale a Þãrii Româneºti ºi Moldovei (secolele XIV- XVI): Drum ºi stat” [The beginning of Wallachian and Moldavian commercial policy (fourteenth to sixteenth centuries): Road and state], in: ID., Geneza statului în Evul Mediu românesc (Cluj Napoca, 1988), pp. 151-205, at p. 199. 65 L. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 223. 66 E.A. GUTKIND, Urban Development in Eastern Europe: Bulgaria, Romania, and the U.S.S.R, 3 vols. (New York, 1972), 2, p. 115. In my work I will use the contemporary names of towns. I have indicated in brackets the names used during the medieval period. 67 For more information about this, see P.P. PAPACOSTEA, “Începuturile politicii comerciale a Þãrii Româneºti ºi Moldovei (secolele XIV- XVI)”, p. 155. 68 The commercial treaties issued on behalf of Polish traders have not survived. See N. IORGA, Istoria comerþului românesc: perioada veche [The history of Romanian commerce; Early period] (Bucharest, 1925), p. 85. 69 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 2 (28 June 1368). 70 See, e.g. DRH D, No. 120 (1413), No. 134 (1421), and No. 136 (1422).

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ation, documents issued in relation to trade activities constitute the overwhelming majority of the documents surviving in Braºov. Out of a total of twenty-one Wallachian pragmatic documents in the Braºov urban archives for dates up to the reign of Aldea (1431-1433), twenty are trade-related. During the reign of Dan II (1420-1424 and 1427-1431) the number of letters patent granting trade rights almost matches that of surviving land charters: fourteen documents testify to writing activities in relation to trade while fifteen charters record landed estates. Dan II seems to have been particularly involved in trade issues. During his short reign, he confirmed the commercial rights of the Braºov at least five times in writing.71 More importantly, written confirmations of trade rights were issued not only at the request of the community of foreign traders but on behalf of Wallachian traders as well.72 In Moldavia, commercial activities of the Transylvanian towns, especially those of Braºov traders, were also dynamic. Ten surviving commercial treaties have been issued by the Moldavian princes on behalf of Braºov traders, in addition to seven letters of invitation to resume their trade. The first surviving documents date from 1435.73 However, in Moldavia trade relations with Poland are the first to be documented. The first surviving commercial treaty, commissioned by Alexandru the Good in 1408, was granted to Lviv traders.74 By the end of his reign, conflicts with the Polish kingdom seem to have curtailed commercial relations between Moldavia and Poland.75 Resumed for a short period during the reign of Petru Aron (I 1451-1452 II 1454, III 1455-1457), they practically ceased after the reign of Stephen the Great.76 In Moldavia, as in Wallachia, political factors influenced the fluctuations of ongoing trade and the production of documents recording its dynamic. In 71 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 9, No. 10 (1422), No. 11, No. 12, (1424), and No. 18 (1431). 72 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 13 (1420-1424). 73 Indirect references indicate that Braºov merchants recorded their rights in writing at least from the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1425) onwards; see: Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2 vols., ed. M. COSTÃCHESCU, (Iaºi, 1932), 2, No. 189. The early trade relations of the Moldavian state with Braºov are mentioned in princely missives; see: ibid., 2, No. 179 (1433) and No. 187 (1434). 74 ibid., 2, No. 176. 75 IORGA, Istoria comerþului românesc, p. 90. 76 In 1456, Prince Aron confirmed the commercial rights granted to Lemberg traders in Moldavia on at least two occasions. Cf. RÃDVAN, Oraºele din Þãrile Române în Evul Mediu, p. 229.

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general, however, the surviving trade-related documents are numerically less significant in Moldavia. Up to the reign of Stephen the Great, out of sixty extant Moldavian documents issued on behalf of foreign beneficiaries, twentythree were issued on behalf of merchants, of which twelve were grants of commercial privileges.77 After the reign of Stephen the Great, the Moldavian trade related evidence is sparse. One exception is the time of Alexandru Lãpuºneanu I (1552-1561, II 1564-1568), since the number of trade-related documents during his reign is a record for both medieval Romanian principalities.

Enduring Oral Practices Recorded in Writing Early treaties indicate that in Wallachia and Moldavia the use of written documents had not replaced oral practices. Political agreements recorded in writing often needed further endorsement through oral rituals. Oath-taking and religious sanctions were recorded in almost all early Moldavian-Polish treaties next to seals and witness lists. In certain documents some details of the ritual were recorded, and it seems that the oath was recorded verbatim.78 In the earliest surviving commercial treaty the commercial privileges bestowed on Lviv traders by Alexandru the Good (1400-1432) are confirmed not only by witnesses but also by a princely oath.79 The treaty of Radu Prasnaglava signed in 1421 includes specific Wallachian religious sanctions as recorded in contemporary princely diplomas.80 We see that here as elsewhere, during the period, oral rituals were often seen as important mechanisms capable of validating agreements between foreign parties. “As there were no other means to enforce the agreements entered into, they had to be backed up by oath and rituals”.81 The texts of the oaths confirm a similar dynamic I noticed in charters: a gradual replacement of Polish influence with the Slavonic pattern. In the early Moldavian-Polish treaties, the oath was recorded as being taken on the Holy 77 The entire collection is published by M. Costãchescu in various editions; see, e.g. Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 176 (8 Oct. 1408), No. 180 (9 Apr. 1433), and No. 186 (18 March 1434). 78 Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 201 (19 Sep. 1436). 79 Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 176 (1408). The original was preserved in the town archives of Lemberg until the end of the nineteenth century. See ibid., p. 637. 80 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 4 (1421); For the original document, see Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 776 (1421). 81 Cf. GOODY, Logic of Writing, p. 102.

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Cross. Although frequently recorded in early Polish-Moldavian treaties, this type of oath is not mentioned in any other contemporary Moldavian document.82 By contrast, in Polish and Lithuanian documents, the expression “kissing the Cross” was used as a substitute for a treaty of alliance, which is evidence of the regular confirmation of agreements being entered into through the ritual of cross-kissing.83 Gradually, in political treaties concluded with Poland, the ritual involving the Holy Cross is replaced by one involving the Holy Gospel, similar to the ritual recorded in charters. A transitional period is marked by the recording of both rituals. In one of Stephen the Great’s (1457-1504) treaties from the year 1496, the oath on the Holy Cross is mentioned along with that taken on the Holy Gospel.84 After this reign, the ritual of kissing the Cross disappears completely from the extant Moldavian treaties.85 It is replaced by the ritual of taking the oath on the Holy Gospel, commonly recorded in internal documents.86 It is noteworthy that a written document began to be used in oral rituals, and that an oath could be taken on this physical object. In a treaty of alliance signed between Moldavian dignitaries and king Sigismund of Poland, the Moldavian boyars took an oath on the written document itself.87 The textual features of Moldavian political treaties in relation to oral rituals bear witness to a dynamic in the prevailing models of influence: while up to the mid-fifteenth century the Polish cultural model was dominant in Moldavia, from then on this began to be combined with South Slavonic features. Surprisingly, Wallachian early treaties issued in Latin do not record either the rituals of oath-taking or religious sanctions. Given this omission, can we imagine that the only warrants of these agreements were the written documents themselves and their princely seals?88 Hardly, as in the few contemporary Sla82

Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 177 (25 May 1411). Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, ed. I. BOGDAN, 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1913), No. 176 (1498); Cf. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in early Rus, p. 175. 84 Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 174 (1496). 85 Documente din arhive ºi biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, Supplement 2, (1510-1703), ed. I. BOGDAN, (Bucharest, 1900), No. 63 (20 Feb.1539). 86 Documente arhive biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, Supplement 2, No. 137 (2 Oct., 1569), the oath of the Moldavian prince, Bogdan Lãpuºneanu (1568-1572) to the Polish king Sigismund II Augustus (1520-1572); see also ibid., No. 176 (27 Aug. 1595) for the last Moldavian treaty signed between the Polish king, Sigismund III, and the Moldavian prince, Ieremia Movilã. 87 Documente moldoveneºti de la Bogdan Voievod (1504-1517), ed. M. COSTÃCHESCU (Bucharest, 1940), No. 75 (22 Jan. 1510,). 88 DRH D, No. 75 (1390) and No. 115 (1411). 83

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vonic treaties, the ritual of taking the oath is mentioned next to the witness list.89 Moreover, the ritual of oath-taking was regularly recorded in the area during this period. For instance, in the peace agreements signed by Hungary and Poland with the Ottoman Empire, extensive Christian vows are recorded. Thus, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, with rare exceptions, written political agreements were reinforced by oral rituals. It seems that until the end of the sixteenth century, most written political agreements were perceived as non-functional without the extra support of oral rituals. Consequently, the failure to record these rituals in some early Wallachian treaties is exceptional and may be due to a scribal oversight. Only from the second half of the sixteenth century onwards does it appear that at the request of Christian states, peace agreements with the Ottomans were not endorsed by the oral ritual of oath-taking.90

The Textual Features of the Wallachian and Moldavian Treaties Diplomatic Treaties Unfortunately, the originals of most of the Wallachian and Moldavian diplomatic treaties are no longer extant, the majority having been lost at the end of the nineteenth century.91 The editors of these treaties have argued that early Wallachian and Moldavian diplomatic treaties and agreements were written by foreign scribes. Although there are controversies regarding this issue, some characteristics of the documents may support the assumption. For example, taking into account the textual features of the early treaties, ªimanschi and Ignat argued that early Moldavian diplomatic treaties were written by Polish scribes.92 Equally, the textual features of the earliest Moldavian political treaties signed by Petru Muºat at Lvív as well as their Latin language persuaded Costãchescu that they were written by Polish scribes.93 Similarly, other schol-

89

No. 115 (1421). PANAITE, Pace, rãzboi ºi comerþ în Islam, p. 303 and note 33. 91 See, e.g. DRH D, No. 75, No. 79. 92 ªIMANSCHI and IGNAT, “Constituirea cancelariei statului feudal moldovenesc”, p. 119; for a different opinion, see CIUREA, “Diplomatica latinã în Tãrile Române: Noi contribuþii”, p. 3. 93 See, e.g. Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 162 (1387). 90

DRH D,

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ars argued that the early Wallachian diplomatic treaties signed with the kingdom of Hungary were written by Hungarian scribes.94 The language of the first extant treaties signed by the Moldavian princes was Latin. However, as early as 1393 Church Slavonic began to be used as well as a language of record in foreign treaties and agreements.95 During the fifteenth century, Latin was gradually replaced by Slavonic, and only two treaties in Latin are extant.96 Other textual features point to the same development. The early Moldavian treaties use the Western convention for dating documents from the birth of Christ. As early as the first half of the fifteenth century, Byzantine conventions of document dating, i.e. from the creation of the world, began to be employed in parallel, marking a transition period. For example, in a treaty signed by prince Iliaº the date is recorded as follows: “In Suceava from the birth of Christ 1433, 5 June. Ghedeon wrote in the year 6941”.97 We may assume that Moldavian diplomatic treaties began to be written by local scribes from this period onwards. Subsequently, the Slavonic copies were dated only according to the Eastern tradition.98 In the same way, in Wallachia, almost all of the surviving fifteenth-century political treaties were issued in Latin. The only extant treaty in Slavonic was concluded by Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521) with the king of Hungary in 1517.99 In my reading of the evidence, the language of the early treaties, the places of their writing (usually outside Wallachia and Moldavia), some textual features, and the wording of the texts support the findings of former researchers that they were written by foreign scribes. It is noteworthy that the early Moldavian diplomatic treaties appear in the form of a contract between a lord and his vassal. The princes pledged themselves to perform auxilium et consilium to their Polish suzerains.100 However, Polish and Hungarian influence was shortlived, and already in the first half of the fifteenth century some specific features of Moldavian charters are to be found in the diplomatic treaties as well. 94

Cf. BOGDAN, “Cancelaria lui Mircea cel Mare”, p. 742. This treaty was signed between the Moldavian prince, Roman I (1392-1394), and the Polish king, Vladislav II Jagello (1382-1434), on Jan. 5, 1393; cf. Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 177. 96 Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 181 and No. 230, written by Prince Ilie to Vladislav (3 June 1433) and by Peter Aron, on 29 June 1456, to Cazimir, the king of Poland, respectively. 97 Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 183. 98 Cf. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 305-6. 99 Documente ºi regeste, No. 153 (17 March 1517). 100 Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 181 (3 June 1433,). 95

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Fig. 3

Trade treaty of Dan II on behalf of Braºov traders. 10 November 1424. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Privilegii, no. 774. Photo: Mariana Goina.

After the turn of the sixteenth century, a similar phenomenon is suggested by the sparse Wallachian evidence. Commercial Treaties Fortunately, many early Wallachian and Moldavian commercial treaties survive in their original form. The first commercial treaty to survive from Wallachia was commissioned by Vladislav I (1364-c.1377) in 1368.101 As noticed, it is the first surviving Wallachian document. It is issued in Latin and confirmed with the Wallachian princely seal with a Latin inscription. To judge by its layout (superscription, invocation, narration, disposition, and date) as well 101

DRH D,

No. 46 (20 Jan 1368).

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Trade Treaty of Stephen the Great on behalf of Braºov traders. 13 March 1458. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Privilegii, no. 777. Photo: Mariana Goina.

as by its language, we may argue that this text was written by a Hungarian scribe. The layout of other early Wallachian commercial treaties written in Latin also suggests that they may have been written by foreign scribes. Their textual features differ from those of contemporary Wallachian or Moldavian charters and follow the conventions seen in contemporary Polish or Hungarian documents. For instance, the treaty signed by Mircea the Old with the Polish king Vladislav includes a proclamation, something that was not standard in Wallachian charters, and the date is recorded according to the feast days of the Catholic calendar and the birth of Christ. The language used is Latin.102 The first surviving Slavonic commercial treaty from Wallachia was issued several decades later, in 1413, during the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418), around the time when the Wallachian princely chancery is believed to have been established.103 The straight lines and regular uncial script indicate a welltrained scribe.104 The subscription in black ink points to as yet non-standardised writing practices, as later princely subscriptions almost always are recorded in red. 102

No. 115 (1411). BOGDAN, “Cancelaria lui Mircea cel Mare”, p. 730. 104 Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 779 (1413). 103

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70 Fig. 5

Trade treaty of Mircea the Old written in Latin, followed by the Slavonic treaty of Dan II. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Privilegii No. 768. Photo: Mariana Goina.

The physical features of the next surviving treaty, commissioned by Radu Prasnaglava (I 1420-1422, II 1423, III 1424, IV 1427) on behalf of Braºov traders, indicate that the proficiency of the scribes employed during the early period in the Wallachian princely chancery could vary.105 The external features of the document, that is, the irregularly cut elongated parchment, irregular script, and poor positioning of the text, all suggest non-standardised writing practices and a poorly trained scribe. Furthermore, the poor-quality parchment used for the document written in 1421 points to a princely office whose practices were not yet well established. Even the attached seal with its Latin inscription is that of the prince’s father, Mircea the Old.106 The large pendant princely seal is attached to the parchment next to the seals of four boyars, another uncommon practice in the Wallachian chancery. By contrast, other almost contemporary commercial treaties granted by Radu’s brother and rival Dan II (I 1420-1421, II 1421-1423, III 1423-1424, IV 1426-1427, V 1427-1431) to Braºov traders display well-trained scribes. Dan II’s commercial treaties are neatly written on good parchment, although varia105 106

Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 776 (1421). Documente privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, p. X.

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tions in convention can still be observed. The languages of record vary as well. Of his four surviving treaties two are written in Slavonic,107 one in Latin,108 and one has two texts, Latin followed by Slavonic, on a single sheet.109 It mentions that the treaty of Mircea the Old was brought by Braºov traders to Wallachia to be confirmed by the acting prince. We see the same practice time and again, foreign beneficiaries in need of their privileges to be renewed had to bring the original documents along. This suggests once again the absence of princely archives in Wallachia at this stage.The positioning of the text on the page (either ‘landscape’ or ‘portrait’) also varies from one document to another. All these variations suggest poorly established writing practices in the Wallachian chancery during the first half of the fifteenth century. The layout of Slavonic commercial treaties conforms to the characteristics of contemporary Wallachian charters. The Wallachian commercial treaties surviving from the first half of the fifteenth century confirm that conventions of the drafting of documents had not yet become standardised. Both Latin and Slavonic were used as languages of record. Only after Dan II, the language of record became invariably Slavonic, although some princes, as for example Vlad Þepeº (1456-1462, II 91476-1477), continued to use seals with Latin inscriptions on Slavonic treaties until the last quarter of the fifteenth century.110 In Moldavia, the surviving princely commercial treaties issued on behalf of Braºov traders point to better-established writing practices. The treaties that survive from short and unstable reigns and periods of political turmoil, such as the commercial treaty of Alexandru II (I 1448-1449, II 1452-1454), issued in 1449, are similar both in their physical features and in their layout to those commissioned during the long and stable reign of Stephen the Great (14571504).111 This suggests that formulary books or copies of issued documents were kept in the Moldavian princely chancery. Later on, both the physical features and the layout of surviving commercial treaties show a remarkable consistency and confirm the evidence of the charters that points to an earlier standardisation of document writing in Moldavia.

107

Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 780. Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 774. 109 Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 776. 110 Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 773 (1476). 111 Compare, e.g. the treaty commissioned by the Moldavian prince Alexandru II (stored in the Braºov State Archives, Pergamente, No. 775 (1449)) and the treaty commissioned by Stephen the Great (Braºov, State Archives, Pergamente, No. 777 (1458)). 108

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To sum up, the period during which commercial and political treaties were produced covers roughly the first 150 years of Moldavia’s existence as a state and even less in the case of Wallachia. These treaties accompany the evolution of these two states from the early stages of their presence as actors in international relations to their quasi-disappearance as significant players in the regional balance, as Ottoman control of Wallachia and Moldavia gradually increases. The extant treaties also testify to the context in which Moldavia and Wallachia came into contact with foreign practices of document producing.112We see that many early commercial and political treaties were produced in response to foreign practices and that they were at least in some cases written by foreign scribes. During the whole period, in Moldavia and Wallachia as in the entire region, the appeal to writing is embedded in an oral culture, in which rituals endorse and reinforce the agreements secured by documents.

Princely Letters for the Exchange of Information with Foreign Institutions From the first half of the fifteenth century onwards, the output of the Wallachian and Moldavian princely chanceries included missives or letters. Most of the surviving ones were produced for foreign communication. Their numbers are small and unevenly distributed. This strongly suggests that the pattern of survival is one of the most important factors to be taken into consideration. From the foundation of the states up to the end of the reign of Michael the Brave (1593-1600), some 840 Moldavian and 730 Wallachian letters have been preserved. Indirect evidence points to many more letters having existed, as a surviving letter sometimes refers to several other (now lost) letters addressing the same specific business issue.113 As mentioned earlier, throughout the entire period researched these letters have survived as a one-sided correspondence: only letters produced by Moldavian and Wallachian institutions are stored in foreign archives, while documents addressed to Moldavia and Wallachia are no longer extant, although indirect references often bring to light their having

112 113

Cf. FRANKLIN. Writing, Society and Culture in early Rus, p. 65. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 224 (c. 1484-1485).

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once existed.114 The great majority of medieval Wallachian and Moldavian letters come from the town archives of Braºov. The dominant themes of these letters are pragmatic. They are related to trade, diplomacy, and administration. Moldavian letters usually address regional and international politics, while in Wallachia the majority of princely letters were issued in response to trade-related matters. The exchange of intelligence information is also a recurrent issue in the Wallachian princely letters. The evidence of Moldavian trade-related letters is very thin. Even the active and varied Moldavian relations with the town of Bistriþa are documented in only a handful of surviving princely missives, which suggests major losses of evidence.115 In addition, the record of Moldavian letters in the Transylvanian town archives is uneven and mainly covers the period when Moldavian princes possessed certain fiefs in the region. Personal issues are seldom attested in the missives of Moldavian and Wallachian princes, while courtesy letters survive only from a small number of Moldavian princes and chancellors educated abroad. Letters exchanged between family members are exceptional, and can be seen to have been written only in extraordinary circumstances. In the Wallachian Slavonic evidence, closed letters were called by the generic term that referred to any written document, kniga (‘book’). In Moldavia, the Slavonic generic name for a written document, list (‘sheet of paper’), also included missives. In the Latin evidence, letters are described as littera in both principalities.116

Missives Related to Diplomacy and Politics The Moldavian Evidence The surviving letters from Moldavia frequently focus on political issues. During the fifteenth century, wider pan-European topics such as concern at the 114 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 920, No. 967, and No. 974; Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului, Moldovei ºi Þãrii-Româneºti, 1, No. 27 (10 Sept. 1542). 115 Documente româneºti din arhivele Bistriþei [Romanian documents from the Bistriþa Archives], ed. N. IORGA, 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1990), 1, No. 162. 116 For Moldavian Latin letters, see, e.g. Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, ed. I. BOGDAN, 2, No. 160 (1481); for Wallachian letters, see Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 298; for Slavonic letters, see ibid., No. 70 (c. 1456-1459).

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expansion of the Ottoman Empire are often addressed in the Moldavian princely letters. The long reign of Stephen the Great turned the principality into a significant regional player, and this development accounts for the variety of letters he addressed to foreign powers. In 1475, Stephen wrote to the Western rulers asking for military help in his fight against the Turkish menace,117 while two other letters attest to his diplomatic contacts with the papal chancery.118 Written communication was also carried on at a regional level, with the administrations of the Transylvanian commercial towns. Moldavian letters sent to Braºov and Bistriþa, although addressing regional issues, remain focussed on the potential threat of the Ottoman Empire. They most often engage in exchanges of intelligence about the whereabouts of the Ottoman forces and their preparations for war, or about the political situation of neighbouring Wallachia, whose princes were beginning to be instruments of the expansionist policy of the Ottoman Empire.119 Only two surviving princely letters testify to direct written contact between Moldavia and Wallachia. Stephen the Great, in his repeated efforts to impose a client prince on Wallachia, commissioned these letters, informing the Wallachian boyars in the counties of Brãila and Buzãu about his intention to appoint a new prince of Wallachia.120 The whereabouts of the letters before they reached the town archives of Braºov, where they are still preserved, will probably remain a mystery. Taken as a whole, the relatively large number of letters of a political nature that survive from the reign of Stephen the Great (75 out of 126 letters) testifies to the fact that for this Moldavian prince the exchange of information in writing was a regular activity. After the turn of the sixteenth century, this exchange of information in writing continued. A significant body of evidence comes from the (first) reign of Petru Rareº (1527-1538), who managed to maintain Moldavia’s role as a major player in regional politics. His political initiatives are attested by frequent letters exchanged with the Hungarian and Polish kings and with the Transylvanian towns. A corpus of fifteen missives bears witness to his political contacts with the Polish and Hungarian kings Sigismund I and Ferdinand I. The 117

Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 143 (25 Jan. 1475). Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 8, No. 12 (Nov. 1474). 119 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 147 (1 Nov. 1475), No. 149 (18 Febr. 1476), and No. 150 (5 June 1476). 120 Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, No. 447 (15 March 1481) and No. 448 (15 March 1481). 118

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Hungarian king pleaded for Rareº’ support in his fight against Ottoman expansion and tried to act as a mediator between Rareº and the king of Poland in their territorial dispute over the Pocuþia region.121 Another collection of 42 of Rareº’ letters, preserved in the town archives of Bistriþa and Braºov, also testifies to his active involvement in local Transylvanian politics. All these missives testify to an almost routine use of the written exchange of information. In his second reign, Rareº’ involvement in international politics ceased because of a stronger Ottoman control over Moldavia. The number of surviving letters decreases and their focus is now chiefly on administrative issues: only 36 out of 121 preserved letters address political issues. Even if indirect references make it clear that more letters than those that survive were certainly written, the records suggest a correlation between strong autonomous princes taking an active role in regional politics and the number of surviving political letters. After the time of Rareº, Moldova’s external affairs were quasi-entirely dominated by the Ottoman Empire, and the number of political letters diminishes accordingly. An exchange of letters is attested for short periods only in regional and local political correspondence. For example, eight letters have survived from June 1566, when the Moldavian prince Lãpuºneanu overthrew a contender to the Moldavian throne.122 After Lãpuºneanu’s reign, the number of political letters decreases further. It may be related to the Moldavian princes’ loss of their Transylvanian fiefs. Thus we see that a quite active exchange of Moldavian political letters can be traced up to the mid-sixteenth century, mainly from the period when the principality was functioning as a regional power. Once Moldavia falls within the Ottoman sphere of influence, the evidence decreases: the Ottoman archives are silent about letters originating from this principality.

121 Most letters are edited in Hurmuzachi collection; see, e.g. Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 2.1, No. 66 (6 April 1535); No. 68 (24 Febr. 1537), and No. 96 (27 May 1537); see also Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului: Moldovei ºi Þãrii-Româneºti, 1, No. 26 (27 Aug. 1542) and No. 31 (8 Dec. 1542). 122 This was Stephen Mâzgã; for more information, see IORGA, Documente românesti din arhivele Bistriþei, 1, and Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 645 (10 June 1566) and note 1.

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76 The Wallachian Evidence

Wallachian political letters differ from the Moldavian ones. The earliest surviving letters suggest that written communication was carried on within the region, mainly with the urban administrations of the Transylvanian towns. The subjects addressed likewise have a local focus, such as, for instance, the struggles of the Wallachian princes to keep or regain their princedom. Up to the reign of Michael the Brave (1593-1601), the Wallachian evidence seldom illustrates an exchange of diplomatic and political documents at the level of the state. Moreover, Wallachian princes appear to have addressed political issues less often in writing.123 Up to the end of the reign of Radu the Great (14961508), only 102 letters out of 274 that survive are political in nature. Later, after the turn of the sixteenth century, the number of all letters that address politically related issues varies from prince to prince, presumably depending on their preoccupations and interests. As a general rule, however, throughout the sixteenth century Wallachian political letters continue to be infrequent and to manifest a strongly local character. Only exceptionally, as, for instance, during the reign of Radu Paisie (1535-1545), is there evidence testifying to diplomatic relations between Wallachia and the kings of Poland and Hungary.124 After this, the extant letters record mainly administrative issues. A revival of political letters is recorded only during the last years of the sixteenth century. Again, the flow of ink is related to a politically active prince, Michael the Brave (1593-1600), and, more importantly, to the circumstance that his personal archives were preserved outside of Wallachia and Moldavia. 238 letters attest to his relations with the German emperor and the Hungarian and Polish kings. Best documented in Michael the Brave’s archive is his struggle for the Moldavian throne against the incumbent prince Ieremia Movilã (1596-1607), who had the backing of the king of Poland.125 Another prince who is well represented in the evidence is Ieremia Movilã himself. His close relations with Poland unfold in a rich correspondence which had the happy fate of being preserved in the Polish archives. From 1595 to 123

The earliest extant Wallachian political letters date from the reign of prince Aldea (1431-

1443). 124 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 779 (2 Oct. 1542); Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului, Moldovei ºi Þãrii-Româneºti, 1, No. 15 (8 June 1535). 125 I. CORFUS, “Corespondenþa ineditã asupra relaþiilor între Mihai Viteazul ºi Polonia” [Unpublished documents relating to the relations of Michael the Brave with Poland], Codrul Cosminului 9 (1935), pp. 1-67.

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1600, 84 Moldavian letters commissioned by Prince Movilã have survived and most of these (67) are addressed to the Polish king Sigismund III or to the Polish chancellor Zamoyski. Another 26 letters attest to Movilã’s contacts with the Transylvanian town of Bistriþa. Among these, besides political missives, we find trade-related and administrative letters, and even letters that touch upon the personal exchange of information.126 We can see that political issues were addressed only by a handful of Wallachian and Moldavian princes. However, the evidence strongly suggests that this is influenced by storage conditions. Had the archives of Michael the Brave, for example, remained in Wallachia, our knowledge about his political activities would presumably have been much more limited.

Trade Regulations and the Settling of Conflicts Most Wallachian letters surviving from the medieval period address trade related issues. In the early period of the Wallachian state, Braºov merchants, as Hungarian subjects, received extensive commercial rights on Wallachian territory, a consequence of the initial political subordination of Wallachia to the kingdom of Hungary.127 For them “(...) the two countries [Wallachia and the kingdom of Hungary] shall be considered as one and they shall go about [in Wallachia] as if in their own country”.128 These rights, endorsed in many commercial treaties granted by the early Wallachian and Moldavian princes, began to be questioned after the mid-fifteenth century. This change seems to have been grounded in contemporary political developments: as the Ottoman Empire’s political influence in the area grew at the expense of that of the Hungarian kingdom, and as the Wallachian state became less dependent on Hungary, Wallachia was increasingly interested in controlling the benefits resulting from commercial exchange.129 The interests of Wallachian traders, often members of 126 According to the extant evidence, Prince Movilã had fewer interactions with the town of Bistriþa; for the few instances, see Acte ºi scrisori; Acte relative la rãzboaiele ºi cuceririle lui Mihai Viteazul, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, ed. N. IORGA, 12, No. 747 (26 Oct., 1599). 127 ª. PAPACOSTEA, “Începuturile politicii comerciale a Þãrii Româneºti ºi Moldovei (secolele XIV- XVI)”, p. 170. 128 See, e.g. trade privileges granted to Braºov merchants by Dan II in Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 4 (1421) and No. 17 (1431); RÃDVAN, Oraºele din Þara Româneascã, pp. 172-173. 129 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 226; D. CHIROT, Schimbarea socialã intr-o societate perifericã [Social change in a peripheral society], 2nd. edn., (Bucharest, 2002), p. 62.

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the political elite, clashed with the rights of the Braºov traders. As the Wallachian letters testify, the princes began to question the commercial rights granted earlier to Hungarian subjects and strove to achieve equality in trade relations. Trade conflict begins to be attested in Wallachian missives from the reign of Dan II. In the first surviving letter, issued to mediate in an individual trade conflict, Dan II urges the Braºov traders to return merchandise taken from a certain Stoica, a Wallachian subject, “if they have to travel safely anywhere [Wallachia] even up to the sea coast”.130 Most of the surviving Wallachian letters, however, were written to resolve structural trade misunderstandings. An additional customs duty collected at Bran castle, at the border between the two states, seems to have particularly distressed the Wallachian princes during the early period, who issue several letters to defend their subjects’ rights and urge the urban authorities of Braºov to resolve the matter.131 The struggle to achieve harmonisation in business and trade and remove the staple rights of Braºov merchants is especially characteristic of the reign of Radu the Fair (14631474), who wrote: (...) you set off the troubles. As my paupers [he means his tradesmen] were going there with their commodities, you took their goods and the profits from them; and they were left in distress, unable [to dispose] of their belongings. Therefore we paid you with the same token.132

Equal rights in the conduct of trade seem to have been accepted only after the turn of the sixteenth century. The political treaty of 1517, signed by Neagoe Basarab with the Hungarian king Lajos II (1516-1526), marks a major and explicit reversal of the privileges granted earlier to the Braºov merchants.133 Neagoe Basarab had threatened the Braºov town administration, saying that if trade reciprocity was not enforced he would impose new limitations on Braºov traders in Wallachia. As the Braºov traders did not take his threats kindly and indeed killed several Wallachian traders, prince Neagoe in turn made new, open threats detailing injuries committed against his own house, his boyars, and against Wallachian traders, killed or injured while trading in Braºov.134 130

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 14 (c. 1424-1427). Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 15 and No. 16 (c. 1427-1431). 132 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 83 (6 March 1470). 133 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 153 (17 March 1517). 134 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 156 (after 1517), No. 157 (c. 1517-1521), and

131

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Not surprisingly, many letters were written in Wallachia in reaction to this protracted conflict between foreign and local merchants. The collective drive of Saxon traders to record and thus defend and keep hold of their traditional dominant position in the markets of the two principalities was matched by the attempts of local merchants to obtain trade privileges that would grant them similar rights. Thus, during the fifteenth century, trade disputes caused much ink to flow in Wallachia. Until the end of the reign of Radu the Great (14951508), 71 surviving letters testify to trade misunderstandings. Some trade conflicts led to the writing of several letters. See, for instance, the conflict involving a certain Mihnea, the brother of Andrei, on whose behalf Radu the Great issued at least three letters complaining about losses suffered in Sibiu by him as well as by others.135 It appears that during a period in which writing was put to use in Wallachia chiefly if not exclusively for record keeping, and mainly on behalf of monastic institutions, trade-related issues motivated the production and circulation of written documents, even if only among a very restricted community of laymen. Were the surviving documents, especially the specific trade documents I am discussing here, a significant part of the documentary practice of the two principalities as a whole at that time, or do they represent only the tip of the iceberg? Certainly, documents issued on behalf of a community more accustomed to records and their archiving had a better chance. A testimony to this is that administrative letters written on behalf of Transylvanian traders are almost the only fifteenth-century Wallachian administrative documents to have survived. Gradually, during the course of the sixteenth century, trade-related documents become less representative of the Wallachian corpus. Already during the reign of Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521), we find only seventeen letters attesting to trade conflicts out of 54 surviving Wallachian letters. Afterwards, especially after the reign of Mircea the Shepherd (I 1545-1552, II 1558-1559), trade conflicts enter a steady decline as a proportion of the surviving record. Whereas from the reign of Radu the Great up to and including the reign of Mircea the Shepherd 31 out of 125 missives address trade conflicts, in the second half of the sixteenth century only six such letters are extant. The decline in the number of surviving Wallachian trade-related missives has an internal logic. Presum-

No. 159 and No. 160 (c. 1512-1521). 135 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 279 (12 Apr. 1500), No. 280 (12 Apr. 1500), and No. 282 (31 May 1500).

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ably it reflects the European trade dynamics occasioned by the increasing hegemony of the Ottomans over the region. In the Moldavian evidence of correspondence, trade issues are seldom addressed. With the notable exception of the corpus of letters belonging to prince Lãpuºneanu, few Moldavian letters document the international trade routes that crossed Moldavia or the regional trade between the Moldavian principality and the neighbouring Transylvanian or Polish towns. The evidence is also silent about structural trade misunderstandings or about foreign merchants as a collective body of commissioners of letters. Only individual conflicts are signalled. Up to the reign of Stephen the Great, eleven missives produced in relation to trade activities are extant. From the reign of Stephen the Great, out of 67 surviving letters sent to recipients abroad, only seven were issued to resolve individual trade disputes. During the reigns of Stephen the Great’s sons and successors, the evidence suggests that letters were usually produced to resolve instances of serious trade grievances experienced by Moldavian subjects, such as death or unjust imprisonment.136 For example, in almost all the cases in which the Moldavian prince Stephen the Young (15171527) mediated in favour of his subjects, they were described as having been imprisoned and detained in the town of Bistriþa.137 Subditus Matheus Desw, for instance, on whose behalf Stephen the Young commissioned a document in 1519, was, according to the Moldavian prince, unjustly imprisoned and illtreated on a charge of murder.138 The number of attested Moldavian trade conflicts increases slightly during the reign of Petru Rareº and his son Ilie (1546-1551), as is clear from fact that from Ilie Rareº’ short reign eleven letters survive. Some missives even address less serious issues: in 1535 Rareº wrote to the Bistriþa urban authorities asking that money owed to a Moldavian merchant, Grigorie, be returned.139 Likewise, few surviving trade-related letters record the commercial relations of the Moldavian principality with Poland. Possibly, Polish traders were more interested in participating in international trade using the Moldavian route that had replaced the earlier via Tartarica than in regional trade with Moldavia itself.140 Lviv traders seem to have been interested in commercial 136

See, e.g. Documente Bogdan, ed. COSTÃCHESCU, No. 68 (28 Dec. 1504) and No. 73 (5 Nov. 1508). 137 Documente ªtefãniþã, ed. COSTÃCHESCU, No. 108 (17 May 1521). 138 Documente ªtefãniþã, ed. COSTÃCHESCU, No. 106 (30 May 1519). 139 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 693 (14 Febr. 1535). 140 The new road, via wallachica, that connected the Baltic Sea and the Polish kingdom with

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privileges granted by the Moldavian princes as long as the Black Sea commercial ports of Chilia and Cetatea Albã remained under their political control (1485). Later, toward the end of the reign of Stephen the Great, when the Ottoman Empire had taken over Chilia and Cetatea Albã, Polish trade in Levantine goods declined on the shores of the Black Sea.141 Apparently, requests for trade privileges by Polish merchants from Moldavian princes were discontinued as well. The scantiness of the trade-related Moldavian record is open to a variety of explanations, either political or economic, such as the withdrawal of foreign merchants from Moldavian territory.142 All we can see is that trade continued at the regional level with the Transylvanian commercial towns, and that from the seventeenth century onwards the number of trade letters exchanged with the town of Bistriþa increased.143 Conversely, the lack of extant trade missives exchanged with Polish kingdom indicates that international trade relations were not replaced by regional trade with Polish towns. The smaller number of Moldavian trade conflicts documented in writing may also be the result of more limited rights granted by Moldavian princes to foreign traders.144 Moving closer to our area of interest, the paucity of surviving trade letters may simply be explained by the discarding of ephemeral documents. We only see that the presence of Lviv, and even of Moldavian, merchants on the coast of the Black Sea is well documented in the account books of the commercial towns of Caffa and Lviv.145 From Moldavia itself, besides trade privileges, little evidence survives to attest to Moldavian trade relations.

the Black Sea and Oriental trade, served as an alternative to the via tartarica that fell out of use after the disintegration of the Tartar Empire in the second half of the fourteenth century. For more information about this, see PAPACOSTEA, “Inceputurile politicii comerciale a Þãrii Româneºti ºi Moldovei”, pp. 167, 201-205. See also IORGA, Istoria comerþului românesc, p. 87. 141 KING, The Black Sea: A History, p. 112. 142 IORGA, Istoria comerþului românesc, p. 141. 143 Documente româneºti, ed. IORGA, 1, No. 16, No. 18, No. 19, No. 20, and No. 21. 144 Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul: Regeste ºi documente din Arhivele oraºului Lemberg [Commercial relations of our countries with Lemberg: Summaries and documents from the town archives of Lemberg), ed. N. IORGA (Bucharest, 1900), p. 34; ID., Istoria comerþului românesc, p. 141. 145 Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul, p.34.

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82 Princely Requests for Foreign Goods Recorded in Writing

The evidence of letters indicates that princes commissioned written documents to order various military goods from Transylvania. Most of the letters record requests for guns. Only sporadically requests of princes for personal goods come into view; and only few princes appear to have used writing for this purpose. Both the limited evidence (circa 150 missives surviving from Wallachia and around 100 from Moldavia) and the issues recorded may suggest that the process of purchasing goods through writing was rather exceptional. Missives seem to owe their origin to particular incidents in the process of the acquisition of goods. For instance, in 1516, the Moldavian Prince Bogdan (1504-1517) produced a letter to demand the immediate return of a servant who, sent to Braºov to purchase guns, had run off with the money.146 Some Wallachian servants sent to Transylvania to buy goods also had to be demanded in writing to be returned, as exemplified by a missive of Neagoe Basarab addressed to the urban administration of Braºov. The Gypsy slave, dispatched to Braºov to acquire various goods, “had chosen not to come back”, and the prince had to send a summons to have him back.147 Additionally, as ruling princes benefited from tax exemptions, most of the surviving letters were produced to inform (and presumably persuade) customs officials that they were the purchasers of those goods and should therefore enjoy tax exemption.148 The existence of these letters indicates that a written record endorsed under the princely seal gradually came to be perceived as more trustworthy and reliable, and consequently could be used (or at least, attempts were made to use it) to obtain the desired tax exemption. For instance, four out of eight surviving letters of Prince Radu the Great appear to have been issued for tax exemption purposes.149 This attempt to avoid paying tax was so recurrent that it became almost formulaic: “Thus I pray your highness, to assist our goodness and not charge my merchandise, and I, in my goodness, shall assist you as you wish”.150 Conversely, the variety of the merchandise that princes requested in writing suggests that the practice was widespread. It may be that ephemeral letters 146

Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul, No. 86. 534 documente, No. 262. 148 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 203. (c. 1496-1507). 149 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 184, No. 201, No. 203, and No. 204. 150 Documente ºi regeste, No. 103, No. 104, No. 136. 147

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were thrown away after the situation that had occasioned their writing had passed. From the mid-fifteenth century, Wallachian princes ordered in writing a wide range of personal goods. Basarab the Young (1477-1481) was among the first Wallachian princes to ask for Transylvanian furniture. Among other items, he ordered ten “nice, round” wooden tables for his house.151 The details provided in the first letter suggest that the prince was a connoisseur of foreign products, and it would appear that other oral or written requests had preceded the first surviving order for private commodities. At the turn of the sixteenth century, Radu the Great (1495-1508) requested in writing a wider variety of products, such as fur coats, furs, textiles, and even everyday goods such as various categories of soap: “and we have sent to your grace our servant Oancea; and I ask your grace to labour for us and buy five pieces of soap for four florins and another five pieces of soap, of poorer quality, for three florins”.152 The precise instructions about the price and quality of the soap also suggest that the acquisition of Transylvanian commodities may have been a regular princely practice in Wallachia. Surprisingly, according to the evidence of missives, after the mid-sixteenth century princely requests for goods from Transylvania gradually decrease in the Wallachian evidence. One of the last requests is recorded in a letter of Mircea the Shepherd.153 Mircea is considered to have been one of the princes who took a particular interest in commercial activities. His commercial record, however, is very poor. This is a confirmation that trade-related letters were only sporadically preserved, even in institutions with well-organised archival practices. After Mircea the Shepherd’s reign, letters recording requests for Transylvanian goods continue up to the eighteenth century, yet they occur only sporadically. The gap in the record of personal merchandise requests is hard to account for in terms of a decline in trade; it is related rather to the chance survival of documents or to a preference for oral means of communication. In Moldavia, likewise, the record of written orders for foreign merchandise is thin and patchy. A profusion of commercial requests for either military goods or personal items is recorded only from the reign of Alexandru Lãpuºneanu (I 1552-1562, II 1564-1568). Only 18 missives dating from before his time have been preserved. The first two surviving letters date from the reign 151

Documente ºi regeste, No. 137 (dated by the editor to 1478 or to 1480-1481). Documente ºi regeste, No. 205. 153 See also the request of the Wallachian Prince Vlad the Monk (1482-1496), in ibid., No. 152

152.

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of Stephen the Great and suggest that, as in Wallachia, letters were produced to establish customs procedures or settle various administrative misunderstandings. In 1476 for instance, Stephen asked the Braºov local authorities to allow the craftsman Michael, his servant, to return to Moldavia with the swords and arms he had purchased.154 A letter from the same reign suggests that, at least sporadically, routine goods such as oil and textiles were requested in writing as well.155 Only Prince Lãpuºneanu appears as a regular commissioner of missives in connection with his personal trade-related activities. Lapuºneanu’s letters were mostly exchanged with Bistriþa, possibly because the town had been quite recently (1526) granted staple rights by the king of Hungary.156 The number of letters attested from Lãpuºneanu’s reign marks a significant increase, with 119 surviving missives sent to the Transylvanian towns. The topics of these letters are diverse. Commercial activities, requests for various goods including personal ones, and the constant need for skilled craftsmen and doctors appear in 78 surviving letters. Lãpuºneanu’s record shows him as an observant and good Christian, a good administrator, but also as a caring husband and a refined purchaser of Transylvanian provisions. He frequently asks for fresh cherries for his sick wife, for dried plums for use during his Lenten fast, or for Transylvanian beer, since both he and his consort enjoy the drink “as it is particularly helpful for our sickness”.157 The commercial evidence that survives from the reign of Lãpuºneanu is unique for both Moldavia and Wallachia. As his letters did not enjoy special archival conditions, this fact is hard to explain except as an individual, specific occurrence. It is merely a suggestion that a regular exchange of letters was possible in Moldavia. Unfortunately, Lãpuºneanu’s regular exchange of letters does not seem to have established a pattern. After his second reign, the exchange of trade letters declined even further in Moldavia, as it did in Wallachia. With the assertion of Ottoman political power in the region, international trade activities via the Transylvanian towns ceased to exist.158 With the fall of the town of Brãila to the Ottomans, Wallachia lost its last gateway for trade with the East. Accord154

Documente ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 148 (18 febr. 1476) and No. 188 (13 Sept. c.1500-

1503). 155

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 165 (17 June 1482). Documente româneºti din Arhivele Bistriþei, 1, p. XII-XIII. 157 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1159 (June 1, 1567) and No. 1019 (5 Febr. 1560). 158 PANAITESCU, “Drumul comercial al Poloniei la Marea Neagrã în Evul Mediu”, p. 144. 156

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ing to Rãdvan, the central international trade routes linking East and West that had crossed the Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia moved further westwards as a result of European economic transformations.159 By contrast, Panaite believes that they continued in use up to the seventeenth century.160 It appears, however, that the number of traders on the move diminished as a result of political instability and the lack of security on the roads. Be this as it may, after the mid-sixteenth century we witness a decline in trade-related documents. The role of trade in the development of written practices and urban institutions is emphasised once again by the decline of the towns of northern Moldavia and Wallachia. After commercial exchange was reoriented towards the Ottoman Empire, we witness the gradual development of southern Wallachian and Moldavian towns. The surviving evidence provides information only about local trade exchanges between Wallachian and Moldavian traders and the Transylvanian towns. While during the fifteenth century the role of trade in the birth and development of writing practices in Wallachia is especially notable, after the mid-sixteenth century the diminishing number of trade-related documents makes them less useful for our study.

Other Personal Issues Addressed in Writing It is hard to define what was considered a ‘private’ letter during the medieval period. As with most medieval letters, the production and reception of a ‘private’ letter involved an oral process and a third person. Letters addressing most personal issues were written with the help of a professional literate and were read viva voce. As Michael Clanchy observed, “Letter writing was an intellectual skill using the mouth rather than the hand”.161 Moreover, the modern boundaries between private and business letters were not observed during the medieval peiod.162 Often, princely requests for medicine for personal use are recorded alongside intelligence, or details of some trade or administrative conflict, which defies any attempt at categorisation. In trying to define private letters I will follow Alain de Boüard, who defined as ‘private’ those missives

159

RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 240-1. PANAITE, Diplomaþie occidentalã, comerþ ºi drept otoman, pp. 145-146. 161 CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 271. 162 M. RICHARDSON, Middle-Class Writing in Late Medieval London (London, 2011: The History of the Book 11), p. 107. 160

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Letter of Prince Basarab the Young to his wife emprisoned at Brasov. Undated, c. 1480. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 106. Photo: Mariana Goina.

that are related to personal rights, even when they are issued by public institutions and written by professional scribes.163 Missives that address personal issues are exceptionally rare in medieval Wallachian and Moldavian correspondence. When they do exist, they indicate that personal issues were shared in writing by the same restricted social segment, being limited to the political elite, and that these letters were written in extraordinary circumstances. Princes were not reluctant to address in writing their basic human predicaments: they often ask for foreign medical doctors, or for medicine from abroad. Stephen the Great’s links with western European institutions made possible his request for physicians from Venice.164 Most often, however, Moldavian and Wallachian princes looked for doctors in the towns of Transylvania. For instance, Radu Paisie asks the Braºov urban officials to send him the physician Gherghe.165 The fact that he knows the name of the physician may suggest that this was not their first encounter. This Gherghe seems to perform many missions: besides his medical services, he appears to have been used as a bearer of confidential information. For example, Radu Paisie’s successor, Mircea the 163

A. DE BOÜARD, Manuel de diplomatique française et pontificale (Paris, 1948). Documente ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 190 (1503). 165 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 341 (undated).

164

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Shepherd, informs the Braºov town officials that he understands the reasons why Gherghe was sent to him.166 Again, it is hard to draw any conclusions about the capacity in which Gherghe was summoned to visit the Wallachian princes. In Moldavia, Alexandru Lapuºneanu’s requests for Transylvanian doctors and medicine are well documented in his surviving missives. For instance, in a letter of 8 October 1564 he asks for the attendance of the physician Andrei at the Moldavian court to treat his eyes.167 One week later, on 15 October 1564, the same physician Andrei has already been sent back from Suceava to Bistriþa to procure the required medicine, unavailable in Moldavia.168 Among the few other personal issues recorded in writing are invitations to wedding celebrations sent to Polish and Transylvanian urban officials. For example, the Moldavian prince Bogdan Lãpuºneanu invites the authorities of Bistriþa, along with those of other Transylvanian towns, to the “remarkable” wedding of his sister, Cneajna.169 Even scarcer is the evidence for any exchanges of information in writing between family members. The corpus of letters exchanged between the Wallachian prince Basarab the Young (I 1474, II 1478-1480) and his wife is one of the earliest instances. The content of the surviving letters points to the exceptional context that led to their being written: the efforts of this Wallachian prince to free his wife from imprisonment in Braºov and to recover the Wallachian treasury, which had been seized along with her.170 The script, language, and layout indicate that the prince’s letters to his wife were written by professionals of the written word.171 After the turn of the sixteenth century, other surviving letters confirm that letters exchanged between family members were limited to practical issues and were most probably written by professionals. For example, the two letters addressed by Mircea III (1509), son of Mihnea the Bad (1508-1509), to his stepmother Voica, asking for financial support for his attempts to win the throne of Wallachia, are little more than requests for money, despite the kinship relations he is keen to emphasise. Both the external 166

Ibid., No. 358 (undated). Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1133 (1564). 168 Acte ºi scrisori, No. 1134, No. 1037 (1 Aug 1560), No. 1163 (20 Aug. 1567), and No. 1164 (29 Aug 1567). 169 Acte ºi scrisori, No. 1180 (12 Jan. 569). 170 DRH B, 1, No. 166, No. 167, No. 168, No. 169 (c. 1480), No. 173, and No. 174 (c. 1480, July-November). 171 See, e.g. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, No. 106. 167

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features of these letters and their layout indicate that they were written by professionals of the written word. Other instances confirm that, although immediate family members of the political elite had access to writing facilities, the exchange of letters was triggered by exceptional situations, mediated by professionals, and designed to resolve pragmatic issues. The use of written communication expressed status rather than particularities of gender. The dependence of princes and court officials on professional literates can also be traced in the case of their spouses. Women belonging to princely families, whether wives or offspring, have a similar level of written culture; they are attested as semi-illiterates, capable of using written communication to deal with their pragmatic business.172 For instance, a widow of a former palatine commissioned a letter on behalf of her servant to help him resolve an administrative issue.173 More importantly, women commissioned letters in order to resolve their own personal issues. To take one example, Voica, widow of Prince Mihnea the Bad (1508-1509), carried on her written inquiries about some tableware ordered from Braºov even after her husband had died. Direct and indirect evidence indicates that these silver cups, ordered by Voica, caused a lot of ink to flow. A number of letters were exchanged between Voica, her stepson, the Braºov town officials, and even the king of Hungary during the princely family’s struggle to get hold of their silverware.174 The Moldavian evidence likewise indicates that not only princes and court officials but also their spouses and families can be considered quasi-illiterate, as they were able to make use of the services of a professional scribe. A noteworthy point is that a princely family had access to professionals of the written word even after the princedom was lost. That the late prince Lãpuºneanu’s daughters asked the Polish chancellor Zamoyski for a letter of free passage for the envoy they were sending to Moscow to retrieve their treasury suggests that pragmatic documents could be asked for by princes and their family members as the need arose.175 Note that in all these examples these women commissioned their letters in extraordinary conditions and, as a rule, after the death of their husbands or fathers. Had the men been alive, most probably the women would have not become involved in the process of writing.

172

MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, p. 41. 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 446 (undated). 174 See, e.g. Documente ºi regeste, No. 18 (1511). 175 Documente culese din arhive ºi biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, Suppl. 2, No. 255 (1598). 173

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It was only at the end of the sixteenth century that certain Moldavian princes and chancellors, familiar with the Polish cultural milieu, began to produce courtesy letters. Prince Ieremia Movilã addressed New Year greetings to the Polish chancellor, Zamoyski, his wife and children.176 His compliments were written in response to Zamoyski’s New Year’s wishes, yet another indication that the dissemination of the use of written communication came as a reaction to foreign practices. The absence at this time of infrastructure and postal services presumably hindered the further expansion and dissemination of letters as a medium for the exchange of information. The evidence clearly indicates that most letters were exchanged in special circumstances, to resolve important practical matters. Even at the princely level contact with far-off places could often only be achieved via occasional travellers. Stephen the Great, whose political relations and contacts with foreign powers were rather ordinary, requested information about his daughter, married and living in Moscow, only through the Tartar Khanate.177 A century later, the richer evidence that survive from the reigns of princes Lãpuºneanu (I 1552-1561, II 1564-1568) and Ieremia Movilã (I 1595-1600, II 1600-1605) suggest that written communication was frequent at the princely level. It appears that princely couriers could deliver local letters regularly. Connections between the Moldavian towns and the town of Bistriþa, for instance, seem to have been very good, as letters sometime attest to an almost weekly if not daily communication – witness the speed with which Prince Lãpuºneanu was able to obtain the services of the Bistriþa physician Andrei.178 In a letter dated 15 March, the prince asks for the physician Andrei, and as early as 16 March we find Andrei being sent back by the prince’s son because his father has died.179 From this exchange of personal letters we may conclude that communication between the Moldavian court and the town of Bistriþa in Transylvania was well established. From the diplomatic, administrative and even personal letters of the Moldavian prince Lãpuºneanu, and later those of prince Movilã and his chancellor Stroici, we learn that communication with some Polish cities, such as Lviv and Cracow, was also a frequent occurrence.

176 Documente culese din arhive ºi biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, Suppl. 2, No. 76 (20 May 1599), 267 (2 June 1599). 177 Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, p. 415 and note 1. 178 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1134. 179 ibid., No. 1171.

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We can speak of the monthly if not daily exchange of letters.180 However, this exchange of letters counted on occasional voyagers, even at the highest state level. In one of his courtesy letters, Stroici mentions that he is taking advantage of the princely messenger to Zamoyski to send his own greetings.181 Likewise, a letter of 1599 indicates that Prince Movilã is sending his letter to the same Zamoyski by taking advantage of an occasional traveller to Poland, a Moldavian boyar going there to attend a wedding.182 Consequently, the evidence suggests that communication with institutions and persons abroad was carried on via occasional couriers even at the highest state level.

Language and Layout of Moldavian and Wallachian Princely Missives More than half a dozen languages are used in the surviving Wallachian and Moldavian missives. During the fifteenth century, Moldavian foreign correspondence was usually carried on in Latin.183 Only letters exchanged with Polish court officials are written in Slavonic.184 In the sixteenth century, scribes working for some Moldavian princes such as Rareº and Lãpuºneanu used German as well as Latin in their missives. At the urban level, until the last decade of the sixteenth century, written communication with foreign entities was carried on almost exclusively in German. In Wallachia, language use seems to have been more restricted. We have mainly princely letters written in Slavonic and Latin. The number of surviving Latin letters is smaller compared to those written in Slavonic.185 It seems that Slavonic remained the language of choice for many Wallachian princes and boyars throughout the medieval period. 180

Documente culese din arhive ºi biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, Suppl. 2, No. 244 (15 May 1598), No. 245 (17 May 1598), No. 250 (11 June 1598), No. 251 (14 July 1598), No. 252 (17 July 1598), No. 253 (17 July 1598), and 254 (9 Aug. 1598). 181 Documente culese din arhive ºi biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, Suppl. 2, No. 246 (15 June). 182 Documente culese din arhive ºi biblioteci polone, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, Suppl. 2, No. 276 (20 May 1599). 183 See, e.g. Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 179 (15 March 1433), No. 187 (21 Apr. 1434), and No. 200 (9 June 1436). 184 Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 164 (1388) and 169 (1400). 185 For more information about Latin missives, see M. HOLBAN “Accente personale ºi influenþe locale în unele scrisori latineºti ale domnilor români [Personal touches and local influences in some Latin letters of the Wallachian princes], Revista Istoricã 29.1-6 (1943), pp. 51-86, at p. 52.

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After the mid-sixteenth century, in Wallachia as in Moldavia, the vernacular languages began to be socially accepted as written languages. In Moldavia, missives were issued in Polish, Hungarian, or Romanian.186 Again, the surviving letters testify to the use of a more limited range of vernacular languages in Wallachia. The main development is that Slavonic was gradually replaced by an early use of Romanian. Greater linguistic diversity is found in Wallachia only later on, in the missives of prince Michael the Brave written in the last decade of the sixteenth century.187 For instance, from 1598 survive sixteen missives commissioned by this Wallachian prince, of whom ten were written in Hungarian, four in Latin, and one in German, along with a signed note in Romanian.188 It is unclear, however, whether the former scarcity is due to a restricted use of languages or to poor survival. Some constituent parts of vernacular missives, such as formulas of greeting in the final protocol, or the address, are recorded in Latin or Slavonic. In the mainly-Hungarian missives these appear in Latin, while in the Romanian letters they are recorded in Slavonic. The address in the Hungarian documents is sometimes written in a mixture of Latin and Slavonic, resulting in a single document that combines three languages.189 The Slavonic language used in most Wallachian letters is Bulgarian in influence, especially in the early letters. Gradually, from the sixteenth century onwards, this becomes mixed with Serbian elements.190 It differs from the language of contemporary Wallachian charters in displaying a stronger influence from spoken Bulgarian.191 Some Wallachian princely letters are particularly notable in this regard. They are written in a very colloquial language, with formulas and expressions that seem to be borrowed directly from an oral exchange of information. Some of the recorded expressions suggest that they 186 For more information about Polish documents, see E. LINÞA “Documente în limba polonã emise de cancelariile domnilor români (sec. al XVI-lea ºi al XVII-lea)” (Polish language documents issued by the chancelleries of the Romanian princes during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries] Romanoslavica 13 (1966), pp. 169-188, at p. 180; See also GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria Moldovei”, pp. 26-27. 187 Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului, Moldovei ºi Þãrii-Româneºti, 2, No. 136 (1579). 188 The corpus was edited by Iorga. See Acte relative la Rãzboaiele ºi cuceririle lui Mihai Voda Viteazul [Documents related to the wars and conquests of Michael the Brave], in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 12 (1594-1602), ed. N. IORGA (Bucharest, 1903), No. 506, No. 525, and passim. 189 See, e.g. Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 1280. 190 BOGDAN, Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, p. XXX. 191 BOGDAN “Diplomatica slavo-românã din secolele XIV ºi XV”, pp. 280-283.

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were translated verbatim from Romanian to Slavonic. All these particularities, together with the verb forms and syntax, suggest that many missives were written from dictation.192 In many missives, the message was directly addressed to the recipient, in the second person singular. For instance, words and language structures employed in early Wallachian political letters commissioned by Prince Aldea suggest that there was no differentiation between spoken and written language, and that the prince intended his letters to be a direct verbalisation to their recipients: Io, Alexandru, prince and master of the entire country of Wallachia. Our Highness wishes prosperity to our brothers, to all of Braºov [citizens]. Look what I am telling you: I struggle to keep off the fire from your parts, and there is no other way; and he who set on the fire, may God pay him back. First, Stan the sword-bearer (spãtar) came to you; I sent you word to give him back to me, but you did not listen to my word; and then Tudor ran to you after he had stolen the Wallachian horses; I sent word to you, to give him back to me, and again you have not listened to me. I struggle for you, so that you have peace. (...) Just for this, I did you so much good, and I struggle to extinguish the fire from your parts and you yourself set fire on your heads. There among you there are Stanciul and Tatul and Vasil and Ulan, who stole horses from my court; if you love your peace and calm send them to me in chains. If you shall not send them back to me, you shall not have peace with me. Otherwise shall not be.193

As we may observe, in both its syntax and its vocabulary Aldea’s letter pays tribute to oral speech. Moreover, the exchanged information referred to is called “speech” and its transmission is referred to as being “spoken”. Similarly, the style of a letter of Basarab the Young, written to the Braºov town administration c. 1479, closely follows the inflections of oral speech. The letter records that the prince: “talks to them and asks how he can trust them since they keep his enemies among them”.194 Here again an idiom borrowed from oral communication is used in writing. Moreover, the word rechi (‘utterance’, ‘words’) seems to have been frequently used with the broad meaning of speech, action,

192 Cf. P.J. GEARY, “Literacy and violence in twelfth-century Bavaria: the ‘murder letter’ of Count Siboto IV”, in: ID., Writing History: Identity, Conflict, and Memory in the Middle Ages, 2 edn., ed. F. CURTA and C. SPINEI, 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 2012), pp. 97-118, at pp. 101-102. 193 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 24 (c. 1432-1433). 194 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 121 (c. 1479).

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and protection: “And again, about those enemies, your highness shall disclose (...) whose words are protecting them”.195 In addition, certain words seen in some Wallachian princes’ intelligence letters also suggests direct authorship.196 We may presume that some missives were written under dictation. These expressions that arguably are verbatim translations from Romanian have generated controversies about the ethnic identity of the Wallachian nobility and their language skills. Bogdan believed that the Wallachian political elite was of Romanian origin; the princes mastered the Slavonic language and dictated their letters in Slavonic to professional writers.197 Panaitescu, on the other hand, argues that Wallachian and Moldavian boyars were of Bulgarian origin.198 This controversy must remain open. We only can infer from the evidence that princely letters were written under dictation. The Latin language of Wallachian and Moldavian missives also suggests that they were written under dictation, which complicates the evidence even further. Certain formulas and expressions of the Latin missives also give evidence of informal language, although less colloquial than the Slavonic of some Wallachian letters. Maria Holban argues that the syntax and to a certain extent the vocabulary of the texts testify that missives were crafted in local idiom. She asserts that vernacular Romanian can be grasped under the Latin structures.199 As a general rule, most Moldavian and Wallachian letters have a fixed structure and a very informal language. The layout of these letters confirms their being written by professionals. As elsewhere, the observance of internal conventions of letter writing strongly suggest that missives had professionals of the written word as their writers.200 Wallachian and Moldavian institutional letters are structured according to the conventional division of letters, with the protocol featuring an invocation, superscription (intitulatio), and address (salutatio). The text of the letter usually features a narration and petition,

195

Ibid., No. 113 (c. 1478). Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 23. 197 BOGDAN, Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, pp. XXXIIIXXXIV, notes 1 and 2. 198 PANAITESCU “Problema originii clasei boiereºti”, p. 33. 199 HOLBAN “Accente personale ºi influenþe locale în unele scrisori latineºti ale domnilor români”, p. 52. 200 GEARY, “Literacy and Violence in twelfth-century Bavaria”, p. 102. 196

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Fig. 7

One of the earliest Wallachian princely letters. Alexandru I Aldea asks Braºov traders for military aid against the coming Turks. Undated, C. 1432. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 306. Photo: Mariana Goina.

followed by the final protocol. However, in early letters this structure is sometimes disregarded, which suggests less well-trained scribes.201 In the Slavonic letters the invocation is mainly symbolic in Wallachia, while in Moldavia it can be either symbolic or textual, but it is usually verbal. The princely intitulatio recorded in letters is simpler than in charters: normally rulers’ Christian names and generic princely titles of ‘prince and master’ are recorded. The superscriptions of former rulers vary; sometimes scribes use Dei gratia folowed by their usual titles;202 in other letters former princes are recorded only with their Christian names and those of their fathers. Boyars are also recorded only by their Christian names and the names of their fathers. Their state function is less frequently recorded. For instance, Dragomir, son of Manea, Wallachian palatine (vornic) under three princes, never recorded his status and simply signed his five surviving letters as Dragomir Manev (“son of Manea”).203 These omissions suggest once more a ‘small world’ where information circulated orally, and where status was expected to be known and con201

For more information about internal and external futures of the Wallachian Slavonic letters stored in Braºov, see BOGDAN, Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, pp. X-XLIX; For missives written in Latin, see D. CIUREA “Diplomatica latinã în þãrile române: Noi contribuþii” [Latin diplomatics in the medieval Romanian principalities: New contributions] Anuarul institutului de istorie ºi arheologie 8 (1971), pp. 1-27; HOLBAN “Accente personale ºi influenþe locale în unele scrisori latineºti ale domnilor români”, pp. 51-86; For the Romanian documents, see CHIVU et al., Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVIleadin secolul al XVI-lea, pp. 37-44. 202 See, e.g. the letter of prince Aron dating from 1458 in: Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 221. 203 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 217 (1474), No. 218(1476-7), No. 219 (1478-9), No. 220 (c.1482), and No. 221 (1477).

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veyed through other mechanisms. The address of the early letters is very simple; with time, especially after the mid-fifteenth century, it becomes more elaborate. For example, in a letter of the Moldavian prince Bogdan (14491451), the urban administrators of Braºov are named as “circumspecti, providi, prudentes viri, amici et vicini dilecti”.204 We also see that, with time, scribes become able to distinguish between available formulae and employ them according to the status of the addressee, as for instance in the Moldavian letters commissioned by Stephen the Great.205 Not surprisingly, narration and petition show great diversity. As noted above, the information is often addressed as a direct verbalisation to the recipient; sometimes it is recorded in the form of a dialogue. The final protocol hardly includes more than a closing greeting formula: “And may God bless you” (“da bog vas veselit”).206 The name of the scribe is almost never mentioned, especially in Slavonic letters. The recording of the date depends on the language used. In the Slavonic letters, the date and place are absent or incomplete; usually only the day and the date of the month are recorded, as in Serbian letters.207 In contemporary Latin letters the date according to the Western style, Anno Domini, is mentioned almost without exception, but the place is not recorded. This confirms that Latin and Slavonic letters were written by different scribes following distinct conventions. Letters are written on paper and sealed with princely small seals. The external features of the more numerous Wallachian Slavonic letters show a dynamic of development. Up to the mid-fifteenth century, we can trace non-standardised written practices in princes’ and boyars’ letters. The paper used for the early fifteenth-century letters appears to be cut according to the length of the message to be recorded. For instance, Prince Aldea’s letters are written on long narrow strips of paper.208 An administrative letter commissioned by Dan II in 1424 has a similar format, with an unattractive and irregular script.209 Contemporary boyars’ letters closely follow the same conventions. For instance, a letter commissioned by Aldea’s palatine is written on a narrow

204

Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 221 (c. 1450). See, e.g. Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 141 (1474) and No. 142 (1474). 206 See, e.g. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 58 (c. 14331435), No. 117 (c. 1478-9), and No. 203 (c. 1496-1507). 207 Ibid., No. 82 (c.1463-1470). 208 Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, No. 300, No. 304, and No. 306 (the letters are undated; they were dated by Ioan Bogdan to c. 1431-1433). 209 Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, No. 5. 205

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strip of paper, the script is not regular, the letter is not sealed, and it is folded in the same way as contemporary princely letters.210 The script of Wallachian Slavonic letters, especially of the first half of the fifteenth century, is semi-uncial.211 It usually looks rather unattractive with its large irregular letters with long strokes and its many abbreviations, although it is quite clear and easy to read. Later on, it gradually becomes combined with the features of cursive script. During the sixteenth century, cursive script is employed in most surviving letters. For Moldavia, semi-uncial script remains specific. Princely letters were written in black ink with subscriptions recorded in red ink. Seals could sometimes be missing from early princes’ letters, or different conventions of sealing could be used, either in the interior of a letter, or (more often) on the dorse. After the middle of the fifteenth century, and certainly by its end, the external features of Wallachian Slavonic letters begin to show standardisation in writing practices. It is usually very easy to distinguish between a fifteenth- and a sixteenth-century letter. For instance, letters commissioned by Neagoe Basarab show mature writing practices. They are written on a whole sheet of paper and sealed with small princely seals on the verso. The script is more regular, with straight lines positioned in the middle of the page, although the format of the letters usually remains large, with long vertical strokes and numerous abbreviations; however, the letters are consistently formed and the text is clearly written.212 Even private letters commissioned by a pretender to the Wallachian throne, Mircea, son of Mihnea the Bad, to his stepmother Voica have a regular paper format and a fine regular script, superior to that of many fifteenth-century Wallachian princely letters. This is an indication that well-trained scribes were now more readily available.213 In Moldavia, the few surviving princely letters suggest an earlier standardisation of writing practices. Usually, princely letters commissioned after the mid-fifteenth century, such as those of Stephen the Great, point to standard conventions. The semi-uncial script of the Moldavian princely letters is very characteristic, with regular straight lines, fewer ligatures and less abbreviation. It is almost impossible to mistake a Moldavian for a Wallachian princely

210

Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, No. 468. BOGDAN, Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, p. XXV. 212 See, e.g. Braºov, State Archive, Fond POB, col. Stenner, No. 23; see also the letter commissioned by Mircea the Shepherd (1545-1552), Braºov, State Archive, POB, Stenner, No. 39. 213 Braºov, State Archive, Fond POB, col. Stenner, No. 18. 211

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letter.214 Even private Moldavian letters show a standard format of the paper used and a small, regular script with straight lines. They confirm the charter evidence for an earlier establishment of the princely chancery and bettertrained professionals. Thus, beginning with the first half of the fifteenth century, we see a quite ordinary exchange of letters between Wallachian and Moldavian princes and foreign institutions. Most of these letters address administrative issues, while personal missives are extremely rare. Whereas it is reasonable to assume lower chances of survival in the case of personal letters, the few that are still extant confirm that they have been written in exceptional circumstances. The few surviving missives with a personal subject matter were written from prison, in search of doctors, or, in more fortunate circumstances, to announce a wedding celebration. Concerning the number of surviving letters, it is legitimate to inquire whether the sparse record is due to a lack of written production or to poor survival. The extant record is clearly structured around the pattern of survival; internal letters have come down to us only exceptionally, and only in foreign archives. Only the layout of letters and language variety can give some suggestions about the extent of letter production. During the fifteenth century, the unsettled external features of Wallachian letters tally with the meagre record. Later on, both the external features of the sixteenth century letters, suggesting more mature written practices, and also the variety of languages of record confirm a greater use of missives, despite a still meagre record. ***

To sum up, we see that, in the Wallachian and Moldavian states, princely offices are responsible for the earliest instances of surviving documents. The evidence is restricted to charters, diplomatic and commercial treaties, and letters. Only the evidence of charters testifies to a gradual increase in their production, although places competent to issue them are largely restricted to the princely chanceries throughout the fifteenth century. The uneven pattern of survival of princely missives does not permit us to trace a possible increase in their production. Only the changes in the layout of letters can give us some suggestions as to the frequency of their production and use. 214

BOGDAN, Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, p. XXVIII.

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Diversification of Document Producers s early as the first decades of the fifteenth century, Moldavian urban institutions are able to produce documents. They appear as the first issuers of documents outside the princely office. In Wallachia, the highest court officials were among the earliest to carry out the task of producing documents. The types of the surviving documents are limited to those known also from the princely chanceries: letters and land charters. In Moldavia, the earliest surviving documents produced outside princely offices are urban letters from the town institutions of Baia and Suceava, dating from the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432), a century earlier than the first extant Wallachian urban letters, which come into view during the reign of Radu from Afumaþi (1522-29). From Wallachia the earliest extant documents are charters commissioned by court officials; they date from the reign of Vlad the Monk (1482-1495). In Moldavia such charters survive chiefly from the second half of the sixteenth century onwards, almost a century later. The number of extant Moldavian and Wallachian letters produced outside the princely chanceries is low; only around 120 such letters survive from Moldavia, and a similar number from the Wallachian principality. The occurrence of land records issued outside the princely office is also meagre in both principalities, those attested numbering no more than about a hundred.1 Why is this the case? Should we assume that during the first centuries of the existence of the Wallachian and Moldavian states writing facilities were

A

1

From Moldavia, e.g. only two charters, issued outside the princely office, have survived from the two reigns of Lãpuºneanu; they were commissioned by a palatine (DRH A, 6, No. 329 (c. 1565-1569) and No. 340 (1568)).

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mostly limited to princely offices? Hardly, as in Wallachia charters issued outside princely chanceries began to be attested from the last decades of the fifteenth century, although in small numbers. In Moldavia, urban letters are attested even earlier, beginning with the reign of Alexandru the Good (14001431). And can we imagine that for decades after the states’ foundations documents were produced only by secular institutions? We will come back to this question later on. The limited number of extant Wallachian and Moldavian charters issued outside the princely offices seems to be determined by their legal status. According to the charters’ own evidence, title deeds that lacked the princely seal enjoyed only a provisional legal value. A clause found in the Moldavian charters mentions that records issued outside the princely chancery are valid only until a ‘proper’ charter has been issued in the prince’s office, “according to the custom of the country”.2 In Wallachia, although this clause does not appear to have been recorded there, the practice seems to have been the same. It is possible that we are dealing here with a version of the Hungarian loca credibilia, places authorised for the issuing and validation of documents.3 It may be that in Moldavia and Wallachia the seal of a court official was a device that legitimised a land record. The difference with the Hungarian system was being that in the Wallachian and Moldavian principalities, unlike in the kingdom of Hungary, it was not the Church but the state and its officials that were considered credibiles and were entitled to issue title deeds. However, their charters had only a limited legal value. We see that the highest Wallachian court officials record their land transactions or endowments with the prince even if they possess writing offices of their own.4 Moreover, land conveyances or other transactions recorded in charters issued by court officials are subsequently confirmed in writing by princely diplomas. The same holds true for ecclesiastical institutions. As a general rule, private donations to monasteries and confirmations of monastic estates were recorded in writing almost exclusively in the princely offices, especially up to the mid-sixteenth century. Throughout the fifteenth century, only two charters produced by religious institutions survive from Wallachia and four from Moldavia. Apparently, monastic institutions had to go before the prince to have their land endowments 2

See, e.g. DIR A, 3, No. 368 and No. 571; DIR A, 4, No. 173 and No. 327. For more information, see RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 68; K. SZENDE, Trust, Authority, and the Written World in the Royal Towns of Medieval Hungary (Turnhout, 2018: USML 41), pp. 72-74, 77, and note 22 for further bibliography. 4 See the case of ban Barbul: DRH B, 1, No. 245 and DRH B, 2, No. 246 (16 March 1494). 3

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secured by a princely charter.5 Consequently, we may assume that only princely charters enjoyed legal value. Land records issued outside princely offices functioned merely as provisional proofs of land ownership. Princely charters mention their being issued to confirm a local transaction, and they refer to earlier charters. For instance, in Moldavia in 1589, prince Petru ªchiopul states that he has issued his princely charter to confirm an acquisition of land by the Dumitru and his father because “he had seen and trusted” the charter issued by Vartic, grand palatine.6 Monastic institutions are also attested as frequently commissioning princely charters to confirm land donations they had previously received or to record disputes settled locally.7 As a rule only the princely charters survive, although we know how carefully monks stored their land charters.8 We may assume that we are looking at a practice of the sigillum authenticum, in which only the seal of the prince carried legal weight in secular courts.9 We see a similar practices in Carolingian Europe, Byzantium, Poland, and Hungary. In Hungary, for example, up to the end of the twelfth century only royal charters enjoyed the legal rights of their sigillum authenticum.10 In Poland, up to the end of the Middle Ages only the seals of the monarch and his representatives were accepted in public law, while the seals of ecclesiastical officials were valid only in canon law cases.11 In the medieval Romanian principalities we can trace a long continuation of exclusive legal rights being attributed to princely charters: records issued by the highest secular officials such as the ban and palatine, along with charters issued by ecclesiastical officials, continued to require confirmation in the princely office. This is not unique: in late medieval Serbia also only princely seals enjoyed full legal authority. This denotes very probably Byzantine influence.12 Up to the end of the medieval 5 For Moldavia see, e.g. DRH A, 2, No. 3 (1449), No. 73 (1458) and No. 79 (1458). For Wallachia, see DRH B, 1, No. 34 (c. 1407-1418), No. 101 (1450), and No. 102 (1451). 6 DIR A, 3, No. 530 (1589, Aug 14). 7 Ibid., No. 489. 8 See also ibid., No. 530 9 Cf. ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, p. 93; RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 68. 10 For more information about the Hungarian evidence, see RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, pp. 66-78; K. SZENDE “Towns and the written word in medieval Hungary”, in: Writing and The Administration of Medieval Towns, ed. M. MOSTERT and A. ADAMSKA (Turnhout, 2014: USML 27), pp. 123-146, at p. 142. 11 ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, p. 93. 12 Cf. BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 189.

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period and beyond, in Wallachia and Moldavia seals of ecclesiastical persons also continued to have only limited legal value. Possibly, as in Poland, they enjoyed legal rights only within areas covered by canon law.13 This practice indicates the limits of the power of the clerical institutions: they seem to have been subordinate to, and controlled by, the power of the secular state. So the small number of surviving charters issued outside the princely chancery may be a consequence of their provisional legal value. Only by the mid-sixteenth century does the evidence suggest a change in practice. The information is conflicting, which presumably reflects a transition period. Title deeds issued at the urban level in Moldavia state that they “shall remain untouched for ever”.14 However, from almost the same period, records issued by regional officials indicate that their charters will be valid only until a proper princely record is issued.15 In Wallachian dispute settlements, urban charters sporadically seem to be accorded full legal value. For example, in a land dispute recorded in 1571 an uncle contested his niece’s right to inherit her father’s land. During the dispute, the prince mentioned that he was giving judgment with his boyars according to the true law and “according to a charter issued by the urban administration of Târgºor” and granted the daughter her father’s land.16 This shows that by 1571 an urban charter was considered sufficient judicial proof, as no further evidence was required. However, there is no significant increase in the number of surviving local charters, although a slight rise can be traced by the end of the sixteenth century. Powerful landowners continued to register their landed estates in the princely chancery, and local charters were often confirmed there. We may therefore assume that those who could afford a princely charter commissioned one. Thus, the continued paucity of charters issued outside the princely chanceries seems to be explicable by their limited legal standing. This suggests that a filtering mechanism caused only legally binding records to be stored.

13 14 15 16

Cf. ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, p. 93. DIR A, 3, No. 567. DIR A, 3, No. 571; for Wallachia, see DRH, 11, No. 69 (1590). DRH B, 7, No. 61.

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Documents Issued by the Moldavian and Wallachian Town Administrations According to the extant data, the Moldavian and Wallachian town authorities were among the earliest officials to possess writing offices. The nature of the early evidence about these towns suggests that urban documents began to be produced as a consequence of relations with (foreign) communities more accustomed to the use of written records:17 the earliest urban evidence consists exclusively of letters produced for communication with foreign institutions. The Moldavian and Wallachian towns attested as the earliest producers of letters have comparable topographical, legal and economic characteristics.18 Most are attested as early pre-urban settlements that grew up along the commercial routes that carried Western and Levantine trade prior to the foundation of the Wallachian and Moldavian states. During the thirteenth century, the general process of colonisation of the European margins by German settlers also reached the Moldavian and Wallachian lands.19 In the towns of Wallachia and Moldavia, as in other areas, privileged German settlers were organised according to so-called German law. These communities played an important economic role.20 They were involved in trade and craft activities and, as elsewhere, appear to have been ranked at the top of the local social hierarchy.21 Their contribution to the birth and development of written practices in Wallachia and Moldavia appears to have been significant. The earliest surviving urban letters are mainly written in German and on behalf of subjects with German names.

Letters The record of urban letters is extremely thin: up to the end of the sixteenth century, only 29 urban letters are extant from Moldavia and 15 from Wallachia. However, the surviving evidence is written in a variety of languages and comes 17 M. MOSTERT and A. ADAMSKA, “Introduction”, in: Writing and The Administration of Medieval Towns, pp. 1-10, at p. 4. 18 For more information about medieval Moldavian and Wallachian towns, see L. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 161 and passim. 19 See ADAMSKA “Away with the Germans and their language?”, p. 67. 20 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 150, 158, 161. 21 Cf. ADAMSKA, “Away with the Germans and their language?”, p. 70.

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from more than a dozen town administrations. I read this as an indication that writing offices were usually available at the urban level in the two principalities, but that the rate of survival of urban records is very low. Also, the keeping of urban registers can be traced in some Moldavian and Wallachian towns, even if not a single register has survived.22 For Moldavia, the emergence of urban writing activities can be observed principally in two northern Moldavian towns, Baia and Suceava. Early letters were exchanged with towns in Transylvania regarding administrative, traderelated and diplomatic issues. Although the evidence is sporadic, with huge time gaps, it appears that letters were, at least intermittently, produced at the urban level in Baia and Suceava throughout the period under consideration. This is our strongest evidence for Moldavian urban literacy, as out of c. 30 urban letters surviving from the medieval period, 23 were issued by the urban administrations of Baia (15) and Suceava (8), towns of well-attested religious, economic and political importance. Baia and Suceava were among the oldest and most important northern Moldavian towns. Both archaeological research and local chronicles testify to their existence as pre-urban settlements as early as the thirteenth century, prior to the founding of the states.23 They seem to have possessed many of the characteristic markers of the medieval towns: they hosted diverse ethnic and confessional groups; their population was involved in trade and craft activities; and they enjoyed special economic status and relative legal freedom. The Moldavian chronicles’ description of Baia as the first capital of the principality of Moldavia has been challenged by archaeological finds, which point rather to the town of Siret as the first Moldavian capital.24 No document produced during the fifteenth century survives from Siret – further testimony to serious losses of the Moldavian urban evidence. The other important issuer of early surviving Moldavian urban documents, the town of Suceava, is well attested as the residence of a local ruler prior to the foundation of the state and appears as the capital of Moldavia throughout the medieval period.25 Archaeological finds point to a place of high population density with diverse confessional and ethnic groups. It was home to the largest Armenian community in Moldavia, along with German and Hungarian Catholic, Ruthenian, and Moldavian Orthodox 22 23 24 25

Documente românesti din arhivele Bistriþei, 1, No. 33 (c. 1604-1619). RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 458, 534. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 459 and note 64. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 534.

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communities.26 Its population was involved in long-distance trading activities; Suceava had a privileged status and enjoyed staple rights.27 As observed above, the early surviving urban letters produced in the towns of northern Moldavia are written mostly in German. This exclusive use of German in correspondence led some Romanian historians to believe that the towns of Baia and Suceava were populated mainly by Germans.28 Others have argued, however, that the choice for the German language was made only on account of the addressees.29 Nevertheless, the existence of a strong German community in the two settlements is confirmed by archaeological finds and by the fifteenth-century documentary evidence. Princely charters describe the inhabitants of Baia as Saxons.30 We should also bear in mind, however, that the use of German was a regional phenomenon that reflects “a model of law imported from Germany”.31 The German communities in the Moldavian towns were organised in accordance with the principles of German Law. They were among the first Moldavian institutions able to carry on a correspondence with foreign entities. The first urban letter surviving from Moldavia (datable to 1421) was produced by Baia’s urban administration. It notified the town officials of Lviv that a German trader, Niclos Hecht, an inhabitant of Baia, had appointed them as executors of his last will and testament; their task was to collect the money owed him by a certain merchant of Lviv. In support of the merchant’s written will, the Baia urban administration produced the personal commercial register kept by Hecht.32 From this unique surviving instance we learn that German merchants in Baia were well accustomed to the practice of using the written word both for their personal needs and for trade matters.

26

RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 536. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 534-541. 28 C.C. GIURÃSCU, Târguri sau oraºe ºi cetãti moldovene pâna la mijlocul secolului al XVI lea [Moldavian towns or cities and fortresses up to the middle of the sixteenth century] (Bucharest, 1997), p. 189. 29 MANOLESCU, “Cultura orãºeneascã în Moldova în a doua jumãtate a secolului al cincisprezecelea”, p. 68. 30 DRH A, 2, No. 26 (1453) and No. 41 (1454). 31 ADAMSKA, “Away with the Germans and their language?”, p. 71; A. JANECZEK, “Urban communes, ethnic communities, and language use in late medieval Red Ruthenian towns”, in: Uses of the Written Word in Medieval Towns, pp. 19-35. 32 Akta Grodzkie ºi Ziemskie, 4 (Lemberg, 1873), pp. 108-109, quoted by P. PANAITESCU “Cel mai vechiu act municipal din Moldova”, pp. 184-185. 27

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The earliest urban letter to survive from Suceava (1472) was written on behalf of a German craftsman from Bistriþa, who, learning the tanner’s trade in Suceava, needed a letter confirming the status of his parents, without which his teachers refused to provide him with a diploma confirming his studies. To this end an urban official from Suceava, Rymer, addressed a judge in Bistriþa, Jerig Eyben, to request the necessary written information.33 Names and issues recorded in the first surviving letters confirm the German community to be among the earliest recipients of documents. The rather minor nature of the problems addressed in writing, added to the circumstance that the first surviving letters were produced on behalf of private citizens, suggests that use of writing at the urban level was quite wide-ranging. For the fifteenth century, besides the German-language letters produced by the northern Moldavian towns, two Slavonic-language letters issued by the urban administrations of the southern Moldavian towns of Bârlad34 and Vaslui have reached us.35 These two letters were sent to the urban administration of Braºov and have been preserved there. They demonstrate that writing facilities were not restricted to the northern Moldavian towns and that in the southern Moldavian towns, which had been founded later, officials also had at their disposal writing offices and professionals of the written word, even if these early literates seem less well trained.36 The external features of the Bârlad letter suggest immature written practices. The paper is irregularly cut, and the letter bears no seal.37 However, the issues addressed, and the names of the beneficiaries, indicate a similar social and ethnic literate milieu in these southern Moldavian towns as in the northern ones. The issues dealt with in both letters point to similar craft and trade activities on the part of the inhabitants of Bârlad and Vaslui. In the course of their business they exchanged letters with the German community in Braºov. However, the use of Slavonic remains intriguing, since it indicates that German was not mandatory: other languages could also be used, even when writing to the same institutions abroad. Bogdan related this language choice to the dominance of a Moldavian population in Bârlad and 33 34

Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 134. The letter is edited in Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 188 (c.

1434). 35

Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 181 (the letter was dated by Bogdan c. 1450-

1500). 36

For more information about the towns of Bârlad and Vaslui, see RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 465-468 and 547-549. 37 Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 501.

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Vaslui.38 The name of one of the urban officials of Bârlad, Hârlea, strengthens his hypothesis and suggests a strong Moldavian community. In the Vaslui letter the name of the town official is not recorded, while the names of the beneficiaries suggest that they belonged to the Hungarian community. We read that the Vaslui town administrators testified on behalf of a certain Petru and his fellows, Tomosch and Barta. Consequently, the names of the beneficiaries of the earliest Moldavian urban letters written in Slavonic testify that in the southern Moldavian towns as well early letters were written on behalf of traders. The use of the Slavonic language by Moldavian urban institutions remains puzzling. During the fifteenth century, its use at the urban level is seldom attested; most surviving Moldavian letters are in Latin or German. An extant trade-related letter sent by the urban administration of Braºov to the town of Vaslui in 1460 is evidence that the Vaslui town office possessed a Latin scribe.39 Then why the choice of Slavonic? This may indeed be related to the ethnicity of one of the Bârlad urban officials, whose name, Hârlea, in effect suggests his belonging to the Moldavian ethnic group. I tend to believe that in the oldest towns, such as Baia, which antedated the foundation of the state, the townspeople preserved a greater degree of autonomy, while in the ‘younger’ towns of the south the central power had more of a say in local administration. This would explain both the ethnicity of the official and the fact that the language of correspondence in this case was that favoured by the central administration. Given the small number of surviving urban letters, it remains an open question whether we can speak of organised urban chanceries in the Moldavian towns, or rather of ‘amateur’ writing offices.40 Nothing is known about those who drafted documents at the town level; neither their names nor their job titles are mentioned in the letters they produced. The layout and external features of the Moldavian letters that have survived from Baia and Suceava show only that, during the fifteenth century, imperfectly trained scribes were active in the Moldavian urban offices, as mistakes can be spotted in the surviving documents.41 A further point is that the letters issued at Baia during the fifteenth century show that ‘occasional’ scribes were in charge of the production

38

Documente moldoveneºti din arhivul Braºovului, p. 10. Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 95 (1460). 40 Cf. MOSTERT and ADAMSKA, “Introduction”, in: Writing and the Administration of Medieval Towns, p. 5. 41 Cluj, State Archives, Primãria Oraºului Bistriþa, No. 194 and No. 243. 39

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of documents.42 There is no continuity in the external features of the surviving letters; the way the paper was folded and sealed, for example, differs significantly from one letter to another. The surviving letters produced by the urban administration of Baia up to the end of the reign of prince Stephen the Young (1517-1527) indicate that a number of different conventions were in use, and that several different scribes were involved in writing letters in the Baia town office.43 It is clear that the role of scribe was not a fixed one.44 I tend to read this diversity of layouts and styles as explicable by a high level of literacy among the German trading community from among whom town scribes were recruited. After the turn of the sixteenth century, the Moldavian urban record is even thinner. Yet, a few new urban institutions are attested as producers of documents. Their letters are written in German on behalf of members of their German community.45 The decline in the surviving evidence may be related to the enduring political instability specific for sixteenth-century Moldavia. It is only from the last quarter of the sixteenth century that seven more letters are extant. The political instability is addressed in some of these letters. For instance, a letter of a certain Kirschner from Suceava sends reports to Bistriþa mentioning the unstable Moldavian political situation. His letters seem to be written outside an institutional setting, as no official is mentioned.46 The rate of survival from Suceava is similar: letters disappear until the mid-sixteenth century. When urban letters produced in Suceava resurface, however, they confirm that by the middle of the sixteenth century writing facilities were available outside the institutions of the Moldavian towns, and that perhaps letters were penned by the burghers themselves. A business letter from 1562, commissioned by two private German burghers of Suceava, does not record any official as its writer, nor it is witnessed by any town authority. This suggests that it was written by a private notary.47 In the last decade of the sixteenth century the production of urban letters in Moldavia diversifies. New towns are attested as issuers of letters, new ethnic 42 43

Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 135 and No. 136 (c. 1472). Cluj State Archives, POB, No. 492, No. 841 (28 Febr. 1514), and No. 843 (26 Febr.

1527). 44 Cf. Á. FLÓRA, “‘Laborem circumspecti domini notarii’: Town notaries in early modern Transylvania” in: Writing and the Administration of Medieval Towns, pp. 313-335. 45 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 905 (1556). 46 Ibid., No. 1350 (12 Sept. 1595) and No. 1356 (28 Oct. 1595). 47 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1065 (24 March 1562).

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groups are recorded as their commissioners, and new languages appear as ‘writable’ at the urban level. For instance, from the towns of Neamþ and Câmpulung we have two letters written in Romanian on behalf of members of the Moldavian community.48 Although these towns were inhabited by strong German communities too, no urban document from Neamþ written on their behalf has survived.49 The names of the urban officials of Neamþ are not recorded in the letter surviving from there; the recipients’ names suggest members of the Moldavian community: The Burgermeister (ºoltuz) and twelve councillors (pârgari) from Neamþ testified that (...) Vãscan from Câmpu Lungu bought a mare from Petrea ªotra, and Petrea ªotra bought it from us in the market of Neamþ, on a market day. When an animal is bought during a market day, nobody asks for a guarantee; so that Petrea ªotra testifies that he bought it [the horse] during a market day.50

The issues addressed in the letter suggest a similar social spread of urban literacy: presumably as the result of a dispute, the town officials of Neamþ had to confirm in writing that Petrea ªotra (a name suggesting an ethnic Moldavian) had not stolen his horse but bought it from the market. At the end of the sixteenth century we also see personal issues being recorded in institutional urban letters. One letter from around the year 1600 informs the Bistriþa town administration about the resolution of a divorce. The names of the commissioner, Gheorghe of Câmpulung, and of the witnesses suggest that they are members of the Moldavian community.51 The letter is written in Romanian, apparently by a local parish priest. Thus, we may surmise that as the ethnic spread of the commissioners of letters broadened, so the issues and activities that involved writing diversified, from strictly trade and administrative matters to (a few) personal, private matters.

48 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1457; RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 519-520. 49 The Saxon community seem to have become colonists of the town of Neamþ at some time during the fourteenth century. See RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 518. When German communities surface in the internal Moldavian record, their members are listed as merchants and landowners, but they appear to be in economic decline, as most records show them as selling land to Moldavian religious institutions, chiefly to Neamþ monastery (DRH A, 1, No. 241 (1443); 2, No. 19 (1452) and No. 45 (1455). 50 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1457. 51 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1458 (c. 1600).

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Letters on behalf of private citizens could also be produced by the princes’ representatives in towns. A single letter of this kind survives. It was commissioned by Nichita Harbuz, apparently a refugee from Bistriþa, and was confirmed by Dan palatine (ureadnic) of Câmpulung, Moldavia. The refugee beseeches the urban administration of the town of Bistriþa to send him some of the possessions he had left behind: (...) And so I wail and beg your highness, I bow down to the Earth before you, I beg you in God’s name to give me back some of my goods, as much as God shall guide you, so that I shall not be so deprived, so that I shall not starve. I have two packs of cheese left with Pintea from Sângeorz. Return them to me so that I will not be left without food.52

The layout of the letter suggests an amateur notary, possibly a priest. The use of the Slavonic language may indicate that Slavonic was still dominant at the level of the state institutions at a time when the urban writing offices had already made the transition to the use of vernacular languages. It is only after the turn of the seventeenth century that we first encounter Romanian being used in letters from princely representatives in the towns of Moldavia.53 Again, the trade-related issues which are addressed in seventeenth-century Moldavian letters suggests that the lack of trade-related evidence from the second half of the sixteenth century can be attributed to loss of documents.54 To sum up the analysis of the Moldavian evidence, the extant early Moldavian letters are evidence of the social and ethnic distribution of urban literacy.55 The names of the beneficiaries suggest that up to the last quarter of the sixteenth century most letters were produced on behalf of the German communities involved in trade and craft activities. Only sporadically do names (such as Negrilã) indicate that members of the Moldavian ethnic group used the urban offices to resolve instances of mistreatment while engaging in trade.56 The evidence from Vaslui and Bârlad demonstrates that the southern Moldavian towns were also able to produce written documents, although there 52 534 documente istorice slavo-romane, No. 527 (undated; second half of the sixteenth century). 53 Documente româneºti din arhivele Bistriþei, 1, No. 162. 54 See, e.g. Documente româneºti din arhivele Bistriþei, 1, No. 16, No. 20, and No. 21. 55 Cf. SZENDE “Towns and the written word in medieval Hungary”, p. 145. 56 Cluj, State Archives, Primãria Oraºului Bistriþa, doc. No. 332; for the edited letter, see Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 239, and Documente moldoveneºti de la ªtefãniþã Voievod, No. 120 (15 July 1526).

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Slavonic seems to be the preferred language of writing. However, the German or Hungarian ethnic communities appear as the commissioners of early letters even in the southern Moldavian towns. The Romanian ethnic group appears as commissioners of urban letters only from the last decade of the sixteenth century onwards. This may have been triggered not only by the Protestant Reformation’s legitimising of the vernacular as a socially accepted language of writing, but also by the dynamics of the ethnic makeup of Moldavian towns. Urban letters written in Romanian and the diminishing number of German letters testify to an increase in the size and importance of the ethnic Moldavian urban communities and to the significant decrease of the German population in Moldavia.57 By the end of the sixteenth century the number of towns attested as producers of documents has increased. Their letters are now written in the vernacular, chiefly in Romanian. We may infer a process of the acceptation of vernacular languages as ‘writable’.58 That we find personal matters being recorded in writing suggests that the acceptance of vernacular languages as languages of record eased the access to written communication of a broader range of ethnic and social groups. These various items of information thus suggest that a broadening and more general dissemination of written communication took place at the urban level in Moldavia. German and Slavonic formulas used for the final protocol of some early letters produced in Romanian indicate that writing in the vernacular was a new phenomenon. The errors made by the scribes suggest a lack of training of literates able to write documents in the vernacular at the urban level. The Wallachian evidence of urban letters is later than that of Moldavia and even thinner, with only fifteen examples surviving from the medieval period. As in Moldavia, these letters were produced by a variety of town institutions, town notaries, and individual traders. The majority of the letters were addressed to the town administrations of Sibiu, Braºov, and Bistriþa. Their subjects are limited to administrative matters, craft- and especially trade-related matters, with as many as half of the surviving documents addressing trade issues. The few surviving letters were issued in a the following urban centres: Târgoviºte (6), Câmpulung (5), Râmnic (1), Brãila (2), Argeº (1), and Târgºor (1); this means that our fifteen letters were issued in six different towns, most 57 58

Cf. RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 430. Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1457 and No. 1458 (c. 1600).

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prominent among them being the towns of Târgoviºte and Câmpulung. Some letters seem to have been issued outside the town institutions; they were commissioned by the trading community or individual traders. It is noteworthy that the Wallachian letters, in contrast to that from Moldavia, were written mainly in Slavonic. Only three extant Wallachian letters are written in German and Latin, and only two Wallachian towns, Câmpulung and Targoviºte, appear as places of the production of letters in a variety of languages. The town of Câmpulung is especially noteworthy. From it, two letters survive in German, one in Slavonic, one in Latin, and one in Romanian. The Wallachian material dates chiefly from the sixteenth century. The earliest three letters which bear a complete date (written in German and Latin) are from the first quarter of the sixteenth century onwards.59 However, what we know of the Wallachian towns hardly bears out the absence of writing activities during the fifteenth century. For instance, no correspondence in German or Latin and only one Slavonic letter, dated around 1500, is extant from Argeº, which is attested among the oldest towns in Wallachia.60 The meagre and late Wallachian record must be a consequence of serious lossed of documents. As Argeº was particularly focussed on trade with Sibiu,61 the damage suffered by the Sibiu town archives may account for the sparse record from Argeº.62 The beneficiaries of the Wallachian letters are not restricted to the German communities.63 As the Wallachian trade letters date from the sixteenth century, while those from Moldavia are mainly from the fifteenth, they suggest that the Moldavian German communities were the first to be involved in long-distance trade activities, with Wallachian traders joining later on. The earliest extant 59

Slavonic letters record only the date of the month and the day. The town of Argeº appears as one of the earliest Wallachian settlements and the residence of a local ruler prior to the founding of the state. There is a historical consensus that it was the centre around which the Wallachian state was later created. The earliest Wallachian princes up to Mircea the Old resided in Argeº, and this is also where most extant early charters were produced. It was in Arge that Vladislav II issued in 1369 the first surviving Wallachian charter (DRH B, 1, No. 3). The only Catholic bishopric in Wallachia (1381) and the Orthodox Metropolitan Church were both established in Arges. The mixed religious communities of Argeº were involved in trade activities, and the names of traders recorded in the Sibiu commercial registers indicate that the Wallachian population was involved in trade activities along with the German community. (For more information, see RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 137-8, 243 and note 6, p. 244. 61 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, p. 247. 62 Documente slavo-române din Sibiu (1470-1653), ed. P.P. PANAITESCU (Bucharest, 1938), p. 3. 63 Documente slavo-române din Sibiu, No. 11 (c. 1500). 60

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Slavonic letter from Târgoviºte suggests that during the sixteenth century the trader communities were mixed and ethnically diverse. Whereas in Moldavia the names mentioned in fifteenth-century letters are almost exclusively German, Wallachian letters from this later period point to ethnically diverse trading communities: To our honest, old and beloved brothers and friends, to the Braºov burgermeister, Lord Lucaci. Wishing your highness health and love, we, your brothers and friends, burgermeister, Lord Mitrea from Târgoviºte and the twelve councillors (pârgari). And we inform your highness about the business of our people, Hristodor from Târgoviºte and Neacºul from Dlagopole; they took certain merchandise from Levantine traders (gelepi) and they gave it into the hands of your people, Lord Lucaci and Lord Hans Childav. And now your people deny it and tell that they had not held that merchandise in common. And your highness, you shall know that Lord Sava and Lord Chircoman and Lord Pera and Lord Ivan Furnicã and other good and old men, traders from Dlagopole, all of them came in front of us and testified upon their souls that Lord Lucaci was in trade brotherhood for life with Hans Childav and they both paid for this together. Good people testified upon their souls. So that I pray and ask your highness to look at their case and do them rightful justice, so that they are paid what is left since your highness is aware how much Hristodor and Neacºul have lost with that merchandise. This I pray and ask your highness. And God bless you all.64

As we can see, the mix of ethnic communities mentioned in the evidence suggests that there was no ethnic restriction on people involved in trade activities and hence on their involvement in the use of pragmatic documents at this later period. The richest surviving body of Wallachian correspondence produced at the urban level comes from the town of Târgoviºte and appears to have been issued chiefly in relation to trade activities (this applies to four of the six surviving letters from there). More importantly, letters commissioned by trader communities do not appear to have been produced only at the institutional level, as three out of the six surviving letters are private. Târgoviºte was the second capital of Wallachia and became the favoured residence of most of the Wallachian princes of the medieval period after the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418). It was one of the most privileged towns in Wallachia. Situated on the busiest of the commercial routes, it became an important market by 1400. 64

534 documente istorice slavo-romane, No. 449.

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It enjoyed staple rights for Polish merchandise and the right of free trade with other Wallachian towns. Its German-speaking community arrived from Transylvania around the thirteenth century and apparently took over the central role in the settlement, previously occupied by an indigenous population. However, in the fifteenth century, the local people appear as already integrated in the community. The population density and the spacious dwellings are indicative of a well-managed and prosperous town.65 The merchants of Târgoviºte are attested as a dynamic community in the registers of the Transylvanian towns and even in the thin Wallachian record. More importantly, they show up as accustomed to the use of trade documents, not only in response to foreign requests but also for their own purposes. Presumably at their request, Dan II (1422-1431) issued a charter on behalf of the traders of Târgoviºte in which he calls Târgoviºte “my town” and grants the trader community unrestricted circulation around Wallachia and tax exemption everywhere except in Târgoviºte itself.66 We note that at the beginning of the fifteenth century at least some Wallachian traders were already aware of the use of written documents as a record of privileges granted. Later on, they are attested not only as passive recipients of princely documents but they are themselves active users of writing to communicate about their business affairs. They inform the Braºov authorities in writing of their decision to move their trading centre from Sibiu to Braºov and ask for written confirmation of their agreement: To the high born, and wise, and God gifted, honest and respectable, much beloved by us and good, Burgermeister and councillors of Braºov, we send our dear regards, as well as good health, from all townsmen of Târgoviºte. We let you know that we conferred and decided that we shall not take out merchandise to Sibiu any longer. Instead, if you agree to write us a book, we will travel to Braºov and stay there for two weeks with our merchandise. If during the two weeks we cannot agree on a price, we shall become free to sell to other traders, be they Moldavians, or [traders] from Sibiu, if they will be trading in Braºov. Or, we could take our merchandise to Sibiu. This we let you know. So that if you agree, do make us an oath book and send it, but only to us, traders from Târgoviºte and to Dragotã from

65 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 296- 297; See also ID., Oraºele din Þãrile Române în Evul Mediu (sfârºitul sec. al XIII-lea începutul sec. al XVI-lea) [Medieval Wallachian and Moldavian towns (end of the thirteenth century-beginning of the sixteenth century] (Iaºi, 2011), p. 234. 66 DRH B, 1, No. 55 (c. 1424-1431).

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Argeº. As concerning the other traders from our country do as you please. May God multiply your years.67

The name of the document they ask for, carte de jurãmânt (‘oath book’), suggests that previously these agreements had been secured via rituals of oathtaking. This request for a ‘book’ (a trade agreement, in this case) confirms that the transition from oral practices to documents had been completed within the trader community. Câmpulung is the second-most important Wallachian town engaged in the production of documents. The range of languages used in the letters surviving from Câmpulung should be emphasised. The five extant letters are written in four different languages: German, Latin, Slavonic, and Romanian. The German letter is the first surviving document from Wallachia that bears a complete date. It was issued in 1524 by the town administration of Câmpulung.68 The next surviving administrative letter from Câmpulung is in Latin (1528).69 Why this diversity in the choice of languages? Should we assume that it was determined by the addressee? This can hardly be the case, as Câmpulung letters are addressed to Bistriþa and Braºov and many other letters sent there from Wallachia were written in Slavonic. Even more confusing is the fact that the third surviving letter produced by the urban administration of Câmpulung, sent to Sibiu, is written in Slavonic.70 The names of town officials do not help to explain the language choice, as none are recorded. Only the names of of the letters’ beneficiaries can give us some indications. We see that the craftsman on whose behalf the Latin letter was produced is a member of the Braºov urban community, while the trade matters mentioned in the Slavonic letter were resolved on behalf of an ethnic Wallachian subject (Stoica Hurduzãul).71 Apparently, in some Wallachian towns we can trace a link between the Wallachian names of the letters’ beneficiaries and the use of the Slavonic language. We may ask therefore whether separate urban writing offices were available in Câmpulung for the various ethnic communities, or whether the diversity of languages employed points to successive ethnic administrations. The surviving material and its incomplete dating precludes any conclusion. 67

534 documente istorice slavo-romane, No. 450. Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 503, (11 Febr. 1524). 69 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 568, (22 Dec. 1528). 70 “Documente nouã privitoare la relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Sibiul în secolii XV si XVI”, No. 67 (c.1500). 71 534 documente istorice slavo-romane, No. 455. 68

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The fifth letter extant from Câmpulung is the first document surviving from the territory of the medieval Romanian Principalities to have been written in Romanian.72 It is undated, but was dated by Bogdan to 1521; it antedates the Romanian documents from Moldavia by more than half a century. It was commissioned by “Neacºu of Câmpulung”, who informs the Braºov administration about the whereabouts of the Turkish army. The commissioner of the letter, Neacºu of Dolgopolie (Câmpulung), is attested twice in the letters of Câmpulung urban officials.73 He is described as involved in international trade; he presumably served as a middleman between Levantine and Transylvanian traders.74 Iorga describes Neacºu as a Wallachian boyar.75 That this first surviving private Romanian letter was commissioned by someone involved in commercial activities emphasises once again the connection between trade and writing. It supports the idea that some Wallachian merchants possessed active literacy skills and suggests the use of Romanian for private purposes prior to its acceptance as a ‘writable’ language at the institutional level. The evidence from Câmpulung suggests quite intense and diverse writing activities at the urban level. Many markers that often coexist with a flourishing early written culture were present there: trade, crafts, and ethnic and religious diversity. The town of Câmpulung was one of the major urban centres in Wallachia during the fifteenth century.76 Archaeological discoveries confirm a diverse religious life: two Catholic churches functioned in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, in addition to several Orthodox ones.77 The extensive trading activities of the ethnically mixed community are attested by contemporary data and by the existence of wide-ranging and enduring trade privileges.78 The arrival of a German community in Câmpulung took place prior to the foundation of the Wallachian state. An inscription of 1300 on a tombstone in a Catholic church that mentions a town official, Laurentius de Longo Campo (Câmpu-

72

534 documente istorice slavo-romane, No. 456. The letter was dated by Ioan Bogdan to

1521. 73 Documente ºi regeste privitoare la relaþiile Þãrii Rumâneºti cu Braºovul ºi Ungaria, No. 187 (c. 1530-1545). 74 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 449, No. 455. 75 Domnia ºi viaþa lui Petru Vodã ªchiopul [The reign and life of prince Petru Vodã ªchiopul], in: Documente privitoare la istoria românilor: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 11, p. 3. 76 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, 264. 77 Cãlãtori strãini în Þãrile Române, 1, p. 39. 78 RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 152-4.

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lung), is the first piece of writing to survive from the territory of the Wallachian and Moldavian principalities after the so-called dark millennium.79 The history of other eastern Wallachian towns confirms that trade and writing were not limited to the German community, especially in the sixteenth century. The names of the beneficiaries of letters produced at Brãila and Târgºor indicate that ethnic Wallachians were also involved in trade related issues and in the exchange of written documents: (...) Cârstea and Costilã testify that Radul from Râhov bought his horse from palatine Stoica during a market day and held a banquet (adãlmaº) in the house of Cârstea. So that Cârstea and Costilã testify to this with their souls before your highness.80

As we can see, this letter from the town of Târgºor points to trade-related activities on the part of its citizens as well as to their belonging to the ethnic Wallachian community. To sum up, the few surviving Wallachian urban letters, of a later date than the Moldavian ones, indicate that in sixteenth-century Wallachia we cannot speak of any ethnic limitations on literacy among traders. Letters were produced on behalf of the German and Wallachian communities alike. Nor do trading communities seem to have been ethnically or geographically segregated. German names are listed alongside Wallachian names and traders from Târgoviºte appear to carry on their business alongside traders from Câmpulung. However, the social component that is characteristic of the earlier Moldavian record can be traced in sixteenth century Wallachia as well: the employment of writing appears to have been triggered in particular by trade-related activities.81 In Wallachia we also see a variety of languages of record. The small number of letters (five) extant from the Wallachian town of Câmpulung are written in four languages. The first extant letter written in Romanian was issued at Câmpulung, in 1521, almost half a century earlier than the earliest surviving 79 For an analysis of the possible status of Laurentius, see RÃDVAN, At Europe’s Borders, pp. 153-154, 158-159; see also Studii ºi documente cu privire la Istoria Românilor [Studies and documents concerning the history of Romanians], ed. N. IORGA, 31 vols. (1909-1916) (Bucharest, 1903), 2, p. 273. 80 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 455. 81 See also the evidence from Brãila: 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 452 and No. 453.

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Romanian documents from Moldavia.82 More striking still is the fact that the introduction and final protocol of some Wallachian Slavonic letters are written in Romanian, suggesting an earlier use of Romanian for private correspondence in Wallachia.83 However, Chivu argues that, unless new evidence comes to light, we should not assign to written Romanian a date prior to the sixteenth century.84 *** The number of surviving urban letters in both principalities is minute. It is therefore extremely hard to trace any development in the use of the written word in the Moldavian and Wallachian towns. However, the variety of languages of the surviving urban letters indicates a much wider use of writing than the meagre record suggests. The surviving early seals of several towns that left us no medieval documents also confirm serious losses of evidence. This poor survival can also be explained by the limited value of letters. Even in countries with a longer tradition of writing, ephemeral documents most often survive only by accident.85 Yet, urban letters often are written records of oral rituals, such as oath-takings or feasts sealing commercial agreements. This suggests an urban culture of oral rituals in which writing practices were as yet in an early stage of development.

Land Records In Moldavia, evidence of charter production at the urban level is very rare and it is concentrated mainly in the last two decades of the sixteenth century.86 Only thirteen charters issued by Moldavian urban authorities have survived, while six other charters were produced by the prince’s representatives in the 82

Cf. CHIVU, Documente Româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 87. BOGDAN, Relaþiile, p. XXXIV. 84 See CHIVU, De la primele texte pânã la sfârºitul secolului al XVIII-lea: Variantele stilistice [From the earliest texts to the end of the eighteenth century: Stylistic variations] (Bucharest, 2000), p. 5 and note 4; see also Gh. CHIVU, M.COSTINESCU, Ion GHEÞIE, et al., Istoria Limbii române literare. Epoca veche (1532-1780) [The history of literary Romanian: The early period (1532-1780] (Bucharest, 1997). 85 BRITNELL, “Pragmatic literay in Western Christendom”, p.15. 86 The first extant Moldavian urban charter was issued in 1580 (DIR A, 3, No. 184). 83

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towns. However, as is the case of the urban letters, these urban charters were produced by a whole range of Moldavian towns, which again suggests a major loss of urban documents. Charters were produced not only by active centres of writing such as Suceava and Baia, but also by smaller towns such as Trotuº, Piatra, and Roman, none of which are attested as producers of early letters. In addition, we have several charters issued by princely representatives in the towns, and also some urban charters that are witnessed by both county and town administrations.87 Taken together, these scattered records indicate that a variety of writing offices were available in urban settlements. Seldom more than a single charter has survived from one and the same place and office. Only from the urban office of Baia three charters have come down to us, and indirect evidence points to three other charters having been produced at Baia.88 Indirect evidence also indicates that charters were produced in other urban offices such as those of Neamþ. Moreover, registers of the urbn offices of the towns of Hârlãu and Trotuº are mentioned in the second half of the sixteenth century.89 The keeping of urban registers in these towns strongly suggests the production of land charters at the urban level were kept on a greater scale than the evidence of the isolated charters surviving from either of these places might suggest.90 The small number of surviving urban charters reflects not a lack of writing activities but the low value attached to urban documents and a weak archival tradition. In Wallachia, according to the surviving evidence, urban charters began to be produced much earlier, from the first decades of the sixteenth century onwards. Yet only three documents are extant from the first half of the sixteenth century. The earliest charters survive from Târgoviºte and Râmnic, which were, as noted previously, places actively involved in commercial activities.91 The surviving record becomes slightly more plentiful after the middle of the century. The urban administrations of Buzãu, Argeº and Piteºti are now attested as producers of land charters. Several names of scribes from the Bucharest urban office have come down to us; this indicates a regular writing practice there. This may be due to the re-orientation of trade activities from the 87

ibid., No. 469. DIR A, 4, No. 243. 89 DIR A, 3, No. 5, p. 236, 239, 432, 433. Cf. as well GIURÃSCU, Târguri sau oraºe, p. 136. 90 DIR A, 3, No. 454. 91 The first extant charter was issued in Târgoviºte c. 1512-1521 (it is not dated). See DRH B, 2, No. 94. A charter also survives from Râmnic (DRH B, 2, No. 157 (14 July 1517). 88

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northern to the southern Wallachian towns. According to Panaitescu, with the reorientation of the main trade routes towards the Ottoman Empire, the southern Wallachian and Moldavian towns gained in importance and emerged as the new capitals of Wallachia and Moldavia.92 Presumably, the growing economic importance of the town of Bucharest led to its emergence as one of the most active writing centres. The Wallachian urban record gradually shows people from more diverse social groups commissioning charters. Presumably, trading activities carried on in Bucharest led to an increase in the number of traders, who, being more accustomed to using written documents, asked for written records for their transactions of property. In this way they created a small ‘literate community’. The Greek community in particular became very visible in recording their purchases of houses, shops, and vineyards.93 Craftsmen such as soap-boilers, sword-makers, and bag-makers commissioned documents of one kind or another.94 The urban charters that they commissioned are among the few extant from Wallachia that record other goods besides land.95 From the last quarter of the sixteenth century purchases of land by Greek merchants begin to be attested.96 By contrast, in Moldavia the commissioners of charters at the urban level remained restricted to high-ranking court officials and monastic institutions.97 The existence of writing facilities at the urban level in Wallachia is attested not only by the few surviving land charters but also by indirect evidence. The Wallachian data indicate not only that more charters must have existed but also that other unrecorded urban administrations, such as that of Târgºor, issued charters, all of which have since been lost.98 ***

92

PANAITESCU, “Comunele medievale în Principatele Române”, 150. 5, No. 226 (1563). 94 Documente privind istoria României, Series B Þara Româneascã, ed. I. IONAªCU, D. PRODAN, B. CÎMPINA. et al., 13 vols. (Bucharest, 1951-1960) [henceforward DIR B], 5, No. 307 (1587), No. 425 (1589), and No. 448 (1590). 95 DRH B, 5, No. 266; DRH B, 8, No. 109 and No. 136; DIR B, 5, No. 425, No. 448, and No. 454. 96 For more information, see BRÃTIANU, Sfatul domnesc ºi adunarea stãrilor în Principatele Române, p. 33. 97 DIR A, 4, No. 292 (1598); DIR A, 3, No. 449 (1587). 98 DRH B, 7, No. 61. 93

DRH B,

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To sum up, we have seen that among the earliest producers of urban documents were towns with multi-ethnic and multi-religious communities. Gradually, during the sixteenth century, charters for record keeping began to be produced in these multi-lingual communities. In the fifteenth century we see ethnic and occupational restrictions on letter-writing. The names of the beneficiaries of the early Moldavian letters confirm that up to the mid-sixteenth century written documents were produced mainly on behalf of German communities involved in trade and craft dealings with their mother-tongue communities abroad. Only in the last decades of the sixteenth century were urban documents produced to meet the pragmatic needs of ethnic Moldavians. In the later Wallachian urban record, beneficiaries of letters were no longer restricted to German communities. The sixteenth-century Wallachian evidence points to ethnically mixed communities of merchants commissioning the same kinds of documents in connection with their trade activities. Gradually, over the course of the sixteenth century we can trace the development of the production of urban documents for internal needs. Mostly charters attesting land transactions have survived. Registers of charters issued were kept at the urban level. These developments are best attested in the same old towns, with their mixed confessional and ethnic communities, which were involved in trade and craft activities. Commercial and administrative relations with the Saxon towns of Transylvania, more accustomed as these towns were to written practices, appear to have had an effect on the use of documents at both private and institutional levels. By the end of the sixteenth century, we observe a greater variety of places and communities involved in writing activities. These changes may presumably be related to the Reformation and its accreditation of new ‘writable’ languages. In both principalities, the earliest use of vernacular languages is attested at the urban level. As elsewhere, urban offices are more open than state institutions to the use of the vernacular in writing.99

The Clerical Milieu as Producer of Pragmatic Documents The early organisation of Wallachian and Moldavian religious institutions cannot be dated with precision. According to Deletant, monastic institutions 99 Cf. MANOLESCU, “Cultura orãºeneascã în Moldova în a doua jumãtate a secolului al cincisprezecelea”, pp. 69-71.

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and their use of the Slavonic language were established before the founding of the metropolitan sees (1359 in Wallachia, 1401 in Moldavia).100 The first extant religious manuscripts written in Wallachia or Moldavia date only from the fifteenth century. They are copied by the Serbian monk Nicodim, who, presumably after the battle of Nicopolis (1396), settled on the left bank of the Danube.101 His first known manuscript, a Slavonic Gospel book, was copied in Wallachia in 1405.102 He is also credited with setting up the Wallachian monastic foundations of Vodiþa and Tismana.103 The Moldavian calligraphic tradition seems to have been established in the first half of the fifteenth century, apparently by Gavriil, son of Uric, who is the scribe of around fifteen Slavonic religious manuscripts copied between 1413 and 1449.104 The earliest Moldavian monastic chronicles also date from the fifteenth century. In addition, the earliest monastic necrologies seem to have been kept from the same period onwards. Unfortunately, the fifteenth-century originals, written on wooden tablets and on the walls of churches, have not survived. The earliest extant copy of an earlier wooden-tablet necrology dates from 1407.105 The available evidence establishes that writing activities were carried on in the early Wallachian and Moldavian monastic institutions. However, monastic pragmatic documents of this period are surprisingly rare. No documentary evidence concerning the setting up and administration of the oldest Moldavian and Wallachian religious institutions has survived.106 Only a few princely foun100 D. DELETANT, “Slavonic letters in Moldavia, Wallachia and Transylvania from the tenth to the seventeenth centuries”, Slavonic and East European Review 58.1 (1980), pp. 1-21, reprinted in: ID., Studies in Romanian History, 2nd edn., (Bucharest, 1991), pp. 92-116, at pp. 95-6, and note 29. 101 E.TURDEANU, Études des littérature roumaine et d’écrits slaves et grecs des Principautés Roumaines (Leiden, 1985), p. 85. 102 DELETANT, “Slavonic letters in Moldavia, Wallachia and Transylvania”, pp. 98-9. 103 For the establishment of monastic institutions in Moldavia and Wallachia and for the surviving Wallachian and Moldavian manuscripts, see TURDEANU, Études des littérature roumaine et d’écrits slaves et grecs des Principautés Roumaines; N. IORGA, Istoria literaturii religioase a românilor pânã la 1688 [History of religious writings of the Romanians up to 1688] (Bucharest, 1905). 104 TURDEANU, Études des littérature roumaine et d’écrits slaves et grecs des Principautés Roumaines, p. 86. 105 D.P. BOGDAN, Pomelnicul Mãnãstirii Bistriþa (Bucharest, 1941), p. 20. 106 Although canon law manuscripts of Byzantine tradition were actively copied in Moldavia and Wallachia, they hardly had a practical function and will not be discussed here. Cf. BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 153.

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dation charters granted to the earliest attested Wallachian monasteries are extant from the end of the fourteenth century.107 By contrast with neighbouring Catholic kingdoms such as Poland, or with Byzantium, Wallachian and Moldavian monastic institutions do not appear among the earliest producers of charters either on their own behalf or on behalf of secular landowners.108 This dearth of monastic charters can hardly be explained by a lack of monastic awareness of the importance of written records. All the evidence testifies to the contrary. Special note should be taken of the charters of the Hungarian king Sigismund (1387-1437), produced at Tismana, by which he granted Vodiþa and Tismana the free exercise of their faith and the enjoyment of their possessions. The charters point to an early monastic awareness of the importance of written records of oral endowments. The king’s original charters were stored at Tismana up to modern times. This is an indication that the provision of safe storage facilities for documents in monasteries was an early development.109 Last but not least, the charters suggest a form of dependence of early Wallachia on the kingdom of Hungary, as the monks judged it best to have their freedom of faith secured by a charter issued by the monarch they perceived as the overlord of the land, king Sigismund.

Land Records An analysis of the scant evidence provided by the fifteenth-century Wallachian charters suggests a commitment of monastic institutions to have their landed possessions recorded in writing. Many charters issued until the end of the reign of Vlad Dracul (I 1436-1442, II 1443-1447) consist of donations of land, properties, or money to the first Wallachian monasteries, Tismana, Vodiþa, and Cozia, or to the monasteries on Mount Athos. It is only in the last quarter of the fifteenth century that extant charters commissioned on behalf of secular landowners increase in number. The better monastic facilities for document storage notwithstanding, the overwhelming majority of monastic charters among the early surviving records testifies to an awareness by the early Wal-

107

DRH B, 1, No. 6 (c.1374); DRH B, 1, No. 9 (1388). Cf. ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, pp. 88, 91. 109 DRH B, 1, No. 46 and No. 47 (1419). 108

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lachian religious institutions of the need to secure their land in writing and of their power to do so.110 Table 2. Extant fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Wallachian charters classified according to their beneficiaries Period 1361-1370 1371-1380 1381-1390 1391-1400 1401-1410 1411-1420 1421-1430 1431-1440 1441-1450 1451-1460 1461-1470 1471-1480 1481-1490 1491-1500

Charters issued on behalf of religious institutions 1 1 4 6 10 4 6 10 6 8 7 13 16 46

Charters issued on behalf of secular landowners 1 2 3 1 3 6 10 3 9 10 17 32 30

Apparently, Wallachian and Moldavian customary law did not cover lay donations to monastic institutions. Donations to religious houses frequently seem to have been contested by family members. The early Wallachian princes repeatedly issued writs to prohibit donors’ relatives from resisting endowments of religious institutions: Io, Mircea, prince and master of the entire country of Wallachia. Our highness gives this order to our highness’s preacher, chir Sofronie, abbot of Cozia monastery. So that [I order] that anybody who shall decide to grant his soul and wealth to Cozia monastery, either boyar, or servant of our highness, or cnez, or any other person named poor, nobody from his kin or his relatives shall either dare to ask for explanations, or say a word about this, since the one who shall dare, shall receive huge scolding and reprimand from our highness. And everything that Anghel from Ocna had given to the holy monastery with his tongue, either his house, or lands and vineyards, movable or immovable goods, or anything, from big to small, all 110

Cf. ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, p. 91.

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125

Writ of Prince Mircea the Old prohibiting the contestation of monastic donations by the family of the donors. Undated, c. 1402-1418. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I. No. 15. Photo: Mariana Goina.

shall belong to chir Sofronie. And nobody from Anghel’s kin or from his relatives, or from his brothers or from our highness’s servants, either sude or globnic [‘tax collectors’] or any other court official shall dare to utter a mere word; and for everybody who shall bestow his soul to Cozia Monastery it shall remain this way, as long as our highness and our highness’s son, prince Michael shall reign. And also after our highness’s death, whoever shall confirm this endowment, our Lord God shall strengthen him, and whoever shall destroy it, our Lord God shall destroy him both in this life and in the future life and he shall be cursed by our Father, and by the Son, and by the Holy Spirit. Amen.111

Wallachian documents of this type are especially common for Mircea the Old’s reign (1386-1418).112 Later, similar clauses were recorded in the monastic charters, which suggests that donations by laymen to monastic institutions were often contested. Extensive spiritual sanctions were put in the mouths of donors to guard against potential interference by family members who might dispute their bequests: (...) And those who shall dare, out of my sons and of my daughters or my family and my kin to ruin this wilful endowment of mine, which I have freely made on 111

DRH B,

112

DRH B,

1, No. 27 (c. 1402-1418). 1, No. 27 (c. 1402-1418); see also DRH B, 1, No. 42 (1418).

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behalf of the holy monastery, as a redemption of my sins, and as a redemption of my parents’ and children’s sins, that one shall be cursed, three times shall be cursed by our Lord God, maker of the sky and earth, and by the most revered twelve apostles and by 318 Fathers who are in Nichaea [Nicea] and by all saints; [they] shall account before terrifying and genuine justice and also he shall not be forgiven by us, the sinners (...).113

In this context, the efforts made by monastic institutions to record their endowments in the princely chancery seem reasonable. They used written records as an extra means of safeguarding the land they had acquired.114 Wallachian monastic institutions are attested not only as the most active commissioners of land records throughout the fifteenth century but also as the first users of charters as proof of their landed possessions during a court case. The first mention of charters being used in this way comes from the end of the fifteenth century (1493). The documents belonged to one of the earliest attested Wallachian institutions, Tismana monastery.115 Laymen’s charters are mentioned in litigation only a generation later.116 In Moldavia the picture is different. From the early surviving land charters, it would seem that Moldavian monastic institutions were less powerful; the number of surviving charters issued on behalf of Moldavian monastic institutions is insignificant. Until the end of the reign of Alexandru the Good (14001432), only 25 out of the 105 surviving charters were issued on behalf of monastic institutions. The commissioning of land charters seems to differ in the two principalities; however, when we look at the number of charters produced by monastic institutions we see the same picture in Moldavia as in Wallachia. From the fifteenth century only two surviving Wallachian charters mention that they were written in a monastic establishment.117 The first records the donation of a certain Petriman to Cozia monastery.118 The second does not specify its place of issue, but its script and layout suggest a monastic origin.119 In Moldavia, we have similarly rare evidence of charters produced in monastic institutions. 113

8, No. 186 (1587). Cf. RADY, Nobility, Land, and Service in medieval Hungary in Medieval Hungary, p. 67. 115 DRH A, 1, No. 239 (3 June 1493). 116 The first surviving lay charter produced as the result of a judicial process dates from 1508; see DRH B, 2, No. 55 (1508). 117 DRH B, 1, No. 57 (1425) and No. 252 (1495). 118 DRH B, 1, No. 57 (1425). 119 DRH B, 1, No. 252 (1495). 114

DRH A,

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From the fifteenth century only four monastic charters survive from Moldavia. The earliest extant charters date from the second half of the century. They record donations by a high Moldavian court official, Ignatie, grand treasurer of Stephen the Great, to two Moldavian monastic institutions, Moldoviþa and Putna. The four extant charters, commissioned by Ignatie, have a similar layout, even if they are apparently written in four different hands – which confirms that, despite the scant surviving record, formularies did exist in Moldavian religious establishments. With the wish of the Father, help of the Son, and grace of the Holy Spirit. I, servant of my Lord Jesus Christ, pan Ignatie, named Iuga, grand treasurer of Stephen the Great. According to our desire, and pure and enlightened heart, and with all our good will, and especially with the help of God, and our love for the holy place of the divine and consecrated Annunciation of the Holy and Blessed Lady, Mother of God and eternal Virgin Maria, which can be found at Moldoviþa. I bestowed three curtains (dverã) of red damask and gold embroidery and a linen (pocrovãþ) [technical terms for cloth used in the religious service] and one cloth (rãcaviþã) made of a similar damask material (camhã) and a gilded silver censer and a horse and twenty-five Hungarian golden coins (zloþi), so that they commemorate me for eternity, on a specific day of the year, Thursday before the commemoration of the holy grand martyr Dimitrie, namely a commemoration service with food and drink (parastas) on the Wednesday night and the Holy Service (liturghie) on Thursday for our soul and for the soul of our wife, Lady Nastea (cneaginea) and for my beloved child, Mihul, and for my beloved daughter Sofia, named ªoptea. And we, O son of our church and righteous friend of ours, seeing your gratitude, we accomplished what we swore to your highness, pane Ignatie, and to your wife and to your children and grandchildren, and [we shall continue] to fulfil our promises [and pray] for your health and soul as long as this holy place shall endure (...).120

The dispositive clause of this charter is structured in the form of a dialogue between the donor and the monastic community as recipients. The first part of the charter is written in the name of the donor (Ignatie), while in the second part the scribe of the charter, the monk Ilarion, along with the entire monastic community, addresses the donor directly and assures him that they have fulfilled the oath taken. In addition to the dialogue form, the interjection ‘O’, marking the respect of the monks in addressing the dignitary, underlines the oral dimension of the text. The structure of early charters seems to suggest a 120

DRH A,

vol. 2, No. 102 (1462).

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continuation of formal oral rituals that were beginning to be recorded in writing. This transition is marked by the third Putna charter, issued in 1476, recording another of Ignatie’s donations, in which the structure of the dispositive clause in the form of a dialogue is preserved, but the information is more schematic, and oath-taking is not mentioned.121 All monastic charters feature a specific verbal invocation and spiritual sanctions. Also in Wallachia some of the textual features of early monastic charters remained unchanged and can still be found in sixteenth-century monastic charters. This similarity suggests that here too some formularies for the drafting of land records may have been used by the monastic institutions from the fifteenth century onwards. Towards the middle of the sixteenth century, the surviving records produced by religious foundations show a slight increase in number. Around twenty Wallachian and Moldavian charters produced in religious institutions up to the end of the sixteenth century survive. Sporadically, gifts by Moldavian boyars to religious institutions are also recorded in private charters.122 The thin record of monastic pragmatic documents may be explained by the fact that monastic institutions stored the documents they had received and not ones they produced.123 As with other records issued outside the princely office, monastic records had limited legal value. The donations of Ignatie to Putna monastery, recorded in three monastic charters from 1476,124 were confirmed by the monks in the Moldavian state chancery two years later.125 We may assume that in many cases monastic charters ceased to be stored after a princely charter was issued. Similarly in Wallachia, even after the middle of the sixteenth century, monastic charters were confirmed in the princely office. The donation of the boyars Bogdan and Radu of Popeºti to the bishopric of Buzãu was confirmed the following year in the Wallachian princely chancery.126 The

121

1, No. 205 (25 Jan. 1476), No. 207 (1 June1476), and No. 208 (29 June 1476). For the first surviving Moldavian private charter see DRH A, 1, No. 289 (1448). It records a land donation to the monastery of Neamþ by a layman, Crâstea. The layout of the charter differs from the usual pattern of later monastic charters. 123 Cf.the Introduction to Documentary Culture and the Laity in the Early Middle Ages, ed. W.C. BROWN, M. COSTAMBEYS, M. INNES, and A.J. COSTO, pp. 1, 6. 124 DRH A, 2, No. 205 (25 Jan 1476), No. 207 (1 June 1476), and No. 208 (29 June 1476). 125 DRH A, 2, No. 211 (1478). 126 DRH B, 5, No. 109 (1557). 122

DRH A,

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well-attested practice of confirming monastic charters in the princely chanceries clearly indicates that greater legal value was attributed to princely charters. It appears that, to make an endowment, the donor had to go to the chosen religious institutions, bestow his gifts, and had them recorded in writing there: “And we, boyars Bogdan and Radu, sons of Danciul from Popeºti, came to the holy bishopric of Buzãu, before father Eremia, and bestowed our vineyard located on the hill of Verneºti (...)”.127 The monastic charter was later on confirmed by the prince. In many cases, secular landowners went to the princely office from the outset to record their donation. For instance, in 1428 a Moldavian boyar, Baºotã Manuil, went to the princely office to record in writing his donation to Neamþ monastery of his village of Baºoteni.128 The evidence indicates that members of religious houses, like all other landowners, also had to record their endowments in the princely chancery.129 In Wallachia and Moldavia, as in Byzantium and Serbia, secular institutions had precedence over ecclesiastical institutions in matters of civil law.130 It is presumably this limited legal power of monastic charters that accounts for their poor survival.

Written Wills Testamentary donations make up the richest type of evidence to indicate the important role of religious institutions in the transition from oral practices to written records. The earliest surviving testaments suggest that early wills were recorded in writing at the request of monastic institutions receiving donations – most of them in the princely chanceries. As mentioned earlier, the offspring often questioned and tried to annul endowments made by their fathers and grandfathers to monastic institutions. Therefore, as with other types of property records, monks secured princely charters as an additional means to protect their acquisitions.131 The formulas used in surviving wills, such as “the donations were made by the tongue of the testator”, clearly indicate that the common practice in Wallachia and Moldavia was to bestow donations ante mortem through speech. 127

DRH B,

128

DRH A,

5, No. 80 (1556). 1, No. 80 (1428). 129 For Moldavia see DRH A, 2, No. 3 (1449), No. 73 (1458), and No. 79 (1458). For Wallachia, see e.g. DRH B, 1, No. 34 (c. 1407-1418), No. 101 (1450), and No. 102 (1451). 130 BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 38. 131 DRH B, 7, No. 5 (1571).

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Similar oral formulas were used in Moldavia even in the last decades of the sixteenth century and at the highest social level. For instance, the Moldavian prince Petru ªchiopu wrote in his will, signed manu propria, that his testamentary disposition had been made “by my own tongue”.132 The endurance of the formula clearly points to a deep-rooted oral practice. Wills ‘made by the tongue’ that were later on confirmed in the princely chancery survive from the second quarter of the fifteenth century in Moldavia: (...) We make it known (...) that this true boyar, pan Oanã Porcu, in his good senses, he himself gave with his tongue, at his death, for his soul, a village, namely Lucaceºtii, on Tazlãul Sãrat, before Pãcura [he gave it] as an endowment to the monastery of the Assumption of Our Virgin Lady Mother of God, which is in Bistriþa.133

In Wallachia the first princely confirmation of a will survives only from 1493. It is a princely charter written on behalf of Tismana monastery, confirming the donation of Mareº and Stãit’s sons made “on their deathbed”.134 Tismana monastery was the major beneficiary of wills recorded in writing. Throughout the fifteenth century, princely charters issued to confirm oral wills are made exclusively on behalf of religious institutions. The procedure of will-making is unclear: we do not know whether the donation “on the deathbed” was first recorded in a private document and later confirmed by the prince. The formulas of the early princely charters simply point to an oral ritual. Only after the turn of the sixteenth century does the procedure become easier to ascertain.135 Usually the donation “on the deathbed” was recorded in a written note by a parish priest or monk. Their notes were later confirmed by a princely charter. For instance, the will of the noblewoman Marga seems to have been recorded at her deathbed in August by monks of Glavacioc monastery as early as September we find the private will written by the monks being confirmed in the prince’s chancery.136 Now and again, records made by monks are extant. The forms of some of them remain rudimentary up to the end of the sixteenth century: 132

DIR A,

133

DRH A,

4, No. 129 (1594). 1, No. 209 (1440). 134 DRH B, 1, No. 237 (1493). 135 See, among many others, DIR B, 5, No. 338 (1587) and No. 346 (1587); DRH B, 7, No. 5 (1571). 136 DIR B, 5, No. 338 (1587).

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Fig. 9

131

Will of nobleman Petriman on behalf of Cozia monastery, written in the monastery. 17 July 1425 (6933). Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 26. Photo: Mariana Goina.

And so, I myself, Lucaci, I testify at my death, how I had sent to the holy monastery and asked for monks to come to my house and take my body to the holy monastery. And so the abbot, and priests, and clergymen came and took my body and buried it in the holy monastery. And I ordered my Lady (jupâniþa) to give out of my wealth to the holy monastery: a village and a Gipsy family, namely Toma and his wife and his children. And the Lady of Lucaci, God bless her soul, rose up and gave out of her entire wealth which was given to her by God, money and cattle; she paid 3000 silver coins, and four oxen, and ten cows, and 100 sheep, and six mares, and ten pigs, and 1000 silver coins for the divine services, and a cart with two horses and with a cover, and a silver cup, and a [silver] spoon, and a barrel of wine; [She made this endowment] in front of clergy and local officials (vãtav) and good people: priest Mikhail, Movila vãtav, and Hilip, and Bãrcol and Toma and Drãgoiu and Drãgoº and Anton and Lopol and Babici and Baºul and many other good neighbours. In the year 7096 [1587] November, 26. Written at the holy monastery.137

As we can notice, the script and language of later monastic charters is still often crude. Usually the donation is recorded in the form of a fragmentary dialogue between the donor and the beneficiary. The dead man narrates the procedure in the first person, but in the second part of the note, the unknown 137

DRH A,

8, No. 233 (1587).

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scribe chooses the third person for his detailed account of bequests and witnesses. Unfortunately, many monastic wills are known only from indirect evidence, mainly when they were copied in the course of later dispute settlements. The value of monastic documents as legal proof remained uncertain. Only sporadically, from the last quarter of the sixteenth century, we see in accounts of proceedings that private testaments began to be judged as sufficient proof, provided they were supported by witnesses. Take, for instance, this record of a family dispute: Stephen made a plaint against his sister Draga for the estates they inherited from their brother Toader; Stephen wanted to have half of his [Toader’s] belongings and [half of] his estate, but Draga, his sister, brought before us good and old people, and Toader’s confessor (duhovnic), [who stated] that Toader had left his estate in the village of Paºcani and all his wealth only to his sister Draga and her children (...) And she brought in witnesses, good old people, and a deed made by [Toader’s] confessor, priest Nicoarã (...).138

Toader’s will calls for scrutiny not only the role of religious institutions as commissioners of written documents but also the role of parish priests as producers of deeds and wills. Despite their limited number, wills show most clearly how monastic institutions began to use documents as proof of their landed endowments. Remarkably, all the wills that have survived from this period are concerned with the inheritance of landed property. This makes us wonder whether written wills were produced only when land was involved, or whether we should suspect a pattern of survival that is exclusively related to landed property.139 In both principalities, greater involvement of monks and parish priests as producers of documents unfolds in the evidence from the second half of the sixteenth century.140 Priests are often attested among princely scribes, but they also write land records at the urban and village levels.141 The layout of many urban charters have many similarities to those produced in the monasteries, which also suggests clerics as their scribes.

138

DIR A,

139

DRH B,

3, No. 520 (1589). 1, No. 5 (1372). 140 For more information, see Chapter 5. 141 See for instance DIR A, 3, No. 471 (1588).

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Later on, with the acceptance of Romanian as a language of record, parish priests came to play a more significant role in the production of local documents. The pattern of dating, with only the day and the month specified (for instance ‘7 April’), found on deeds and letters written in Romanian, is similar to the pattern of dating found on letters written in Slavonic.142 This may be a sign that these priests were familiar with the Slavonic model of letter writing, or that they were trained in the same (religious) milieu as their colleagues who wrote the Slavonic letters.

Other Pragmatic Documents Issued by Religious Authorities In medieval Wallachia and Moldavia, religious officials often exercised secular administrative duties. We frequently find them among princely advisers in cases of judicial settlements, carrying out foreign diplomatic missions, and even resolving administrative conflicts between local and Transylvanian subjects. In the process, religious officials often issued written documents. For example, the Wallachian bishop Macarie can be seen issuing letters next to Wallachian court officials to solve the conflict between the Wallachian prince Basarab and Transylvanian officials. A century later, we have the same picture. In c. 1541 the archbishop of Wallachia, Varlaam, wrote to the Braºov urban officials on behalf of a trader from Târgoviºte about a trade issue involving both areas.143 Thus we see a blurring of the duties of religious and secular officials throughout the medieval period. The external features and layout of letters issued by religious officials point to established written practices. Most of them stand in sharp contrast to contemporary princes’ and boyars’ letters, which often use colloquial language.144 According to the extant evidence, judicial charters seem to have been issued only as a result of trials held at the princely courts. However, there is information suggesting that ecclesiastical courts were also held in Medieval Wallachia and Moldavia, and that in their settlements of disputes ecclesiastical officials produced and used a variety of written documents. It is not impossible 142

Acte relative la rãzboaiele ºi cuceririle lui Mihai Viteazul, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, ed. N. IORGA (Bucharest, 1903), 12, No. 471 (1600). 143 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 181 (c. 1541). 144 Cf. ibid., No. 227 (1480) and No. 127 (c. 1480).

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that canon law manuscripts, so lavishly copied in the medieval Romanian principalities, were used in the settlement of cases that fell under canon law. Unfortunately, we have no information about the procedures of ecclesiastical courts. Only one charter recording the outcome of a religious court case survives. It shows a plethora of written documents being used by this institution: The first among us, the meek [Dionisie, the archbishop of Wallachia] (Intâi stãtãtor fiind smerenia noastrã), in the presence of the holy archbishop of Chesareea and God’s loving bishop of Roman. Scribe Gheorghe came before our highness and told us that he had a wife named Drãguþa, who, without his knowledge, long ago had gone to God’s loving bishop of Huºi, chir Ioan, and with cunning and craft obtained from him a sentence of divorce [that allowed her to divorce Gheorghe]. And as the time passed, he himself [scribe Gheorghe] went to the same God-loving bishop of Huºi and told him his case, how his wife Drãguþa took her book of divorce with craft. Ioan, the God-loving bishop gave him a book of exculpation so that his wife Drãguþa shall take him back, the above-named scribe Gheorghe; while reporting this, he [scribe Gheorghe] showed us a book issued by God’s loving bishop. But the brother of the above-mentioned Drãguþa, Onufrie, told that this book, through which Gheorghe claims to have been absolved by the holy bishop, was made with craft, and it is not made by the holy bishop but by a monk named Isaia who took from Gheorghe three beehives and forged the bishop’s book and gave it to him.145

The case seems to be about a marriage contract and its disputed termination. Attempts by wives to terminate a marriage contract are also recorded in letters of the period. It seems that at least for the better-off strata of society annulling a marriage required that the case be brought before an ecclesiastical court. Many types of written documents appear to have been produced for these courts. We see that a divorce could be allowed or withdrawn through a ‘bill of divorce’ or a ‘bill of absolution’ granted by a high ecclesiastical authority.146 Apparently, only high ecclesiastical officials were entitled to issue ‘books of divorce’, or ‘books of absolution’, as these are called in the evidence. More145

4, No. 363 (1600). In law codes copied in Moldavia and Wallachia during the sixteenth century it is stipulated that only bishops had the right to administer justice; Cf. Gh. CRONÞ, “Instanþele de judecatã ale Bisericii din Þãrile Române în secolele XIV-XVII” [Ecclesiastical judicial courts in Wallachia from the fourteenth to the seventeenth century], Mitropolia Moldovei ºi Sucevei 52.5-6 (1976), pp. 338-360, at p. 339 146

DIR A,

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over, they could be forged and used as instruments to perpetuate or annul a marriage. The bishop’s charter suggests that the outcomes of canon law cases could be recorded in writing. It further suggests that written documents were available beyond the restricted ranks of landowners and religious institutions. The fact that Gheorghe is identified as a scribe suggests high social status. We see once again that written documents were produced on behalf of a restricted social class. The ‘books of divorce / absolution’ evoked in this private case, with the implication that he used them, were nothing out of the ordinary, and the possibility that one could buy or fake them demonstrates their accepted use, at least among the wealthier social strata. This particular case, involving a scribe allegedly bribing a monk to forge a bishop’s letter, points to a clear compartmentalisation of documents. Presumably the issuing of certain types of bishop’s letters required knowledge of their formulary. Although no document of the type has survived, their use in Wallachia is also brought up by the indirect evidence. From the evidence of travellers’ accounts we can deduce that Wallachian men were also able to terminate their marriage contracts by sending their wives a ‘book of divorce’ (repudii libellus).147 *** Various scraps of information point not only to a monastic awareness of the value of written records as proofs of ownership but also to the monks’ ability to produce, use and store them. The duties of various religious officials involved judicial work and, in the process, they held courts and commissioned documents. The wide range of types of documents required and used by these courts is noteworthy. Unfortunately, most are lost without trace. The poor record, concerning both their number and the types of extant monastic documents, is presumably related to their limited legal value and, paradoxically, to the monastic orders’ literacy and their ability to organise the storage (and destruction) of their records according to their use and function. Monastic institutions succeeded in establishing the first functional archives in the medieval Romanian principalities. Their collections of charters are the richest that have been preserved from medieval Wallachia and Moldavia. Consequently, we may assume that the thin pragmatic monastic record is not a sign of illiteracy but 147

Cãlãtori strãini despre Þãrile Române, 2, pp. 260, 382.

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rather of a cultural context that made monastic institutions dependent on the central power of the prince.

Documents Issued by Court Officials The surviving documents commissioned by Moldavian and Wallachian noblemen are almost invariably restricted to land-related records and letters used in foreign communication. It is only exceptionally that an internal exchange of administrative information in writing is recorded in the surviving evidence. The great majority of documents commissioned by boyars were produced at the institutional level, by court officials.

Letters The surviving letters produced by court officials are similar to those commissioned by the princes. They are written in response to practical issues: exchange of intelligence information, trade and administrative conflicts. Like their princes, apparently the boyars only seldom addressed personal issues. All extant letters are preserved in foreign archives. The evidence starts relatively early (1430), but it is rare. Fewer than a hundred closed letters survive from Moldavia (c. 90) and somewhat more (c. 120) from Wallachia. Throughout the fifteenth century, the surviving letters were produced largely by a handful of court officials, mainly by those whose duties presumed a familiarity with documents. The palatine (vornic), chancellor (logofãt), and treasurer (vistiernic) are among the earliest authors of letters. After the turn of the sixteenth century, other officials are also recorded as commissioners of documents, among them chamberlains (postelnic), masters of arms (clucer), and constables (pârcãlab). Only very occasionally have private letters commissioned by Moldavian and Wallachian court officials survived. As in the case of princely letters, the contexts of their production point to exceptional situations.

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The Wallachian Evidence The richest Wallachian evidence of letters commissioned by court officials is stored in the town archives of Braºov. From the first half of the fifteenth century, Wallachian court officials, acting on behalf of the princes, often produced letters to enquire about trade disputes involving Wallachian subjects. Commercial treaties required that misunderstandings between local and foreign traders be resolved at the highest state level, by the ruling Wallachian and Moldavian princes. The commercial treaty of Radu Prasnaglava (1421, 14241427) indicates that Wallachian subjects were allowed to resolve their trade misunderstandings only before the prince of Wallachia.148 Moldavian commercial treaties also specify that misunderstandings involving their subjects shall be resolved only at the prince’s level.149 However, from an early period we see court officials acting as active mediators between foreign and local traders. Boyars not only sorted out individual misunderstandings on behalf of their princes’ subjects but also commissioned documents to settle structural trade problems between Wallachian and Transylvanian subjects. Acting for the princes, they commissioned letters inviting Braºov traders and guaranteeing safe travel across the territory of Wallachia. Thus Albul, palatine to Aldea (ruled 1431-1433), can be found assuring Braºov traders that “(...) you can securely and safely travel throughout Wallachia, since we take pleasure in your being our brothers, as you always have been”.150 In the same way, the urban officials of Braºov and Bistriþa sent their (trade) complaints not only to the princes but to the Wallachian officials as well. Possibly, given the very frequent replacement of one prince of Wallachia by another, certain court officials were better known and trusted. In this process we see Wallachian court officials as frequent commissioners of letters. During the fifteenth century, the Wallachian palatine was one of the most active authors of the surviving administrative and trade-related letters. The evidence testifies to the breadth of his duties. Among them we may note the settlement of disputes on behalf of both Wallachian subjects and foreign ethnic groups. In the process, the palatine seems to be constantly exchanging letters either with the local princes or with foreign institutions. Among the issues addressed in the palatine’s letters are trade-related conflicts and disputes 148

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 4 (1421). Documente moldoveneºti inainte de Stefan cel Mare, No. 189 (1435). 150 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 208 (c. 1431-1433). 149

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Fig. 10 Palatine of Radu IV on behalf of Stanislav, who is acused by Marco, whose son came to Wallachia to teach Stanislav a foreign language but ran to the Turks. Undated, c. 1496-1504. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 536. Photo: Mariana Goina.

about land. Unfortunately, these letters had a low chance of survival. From Dragomir, son of Manea, as he styles himself in his letters, five letters have survived, written for a variety of administrative purposes. It seems that he served as palatine under four Wallachian princes (c. 1474-1492), and he appears to have been one of the most prominent and stable political figures of the time.151 His letters testify to the continuous exchange of written information with Braºov officials. We see him as a busy author of letters to ensure the active exchange of intelligence at the regional level, both to guarantee safe travel for German traders and to resolve his own personal trading affairs.152 From a roughly contemporary Wallachian political figure, Dragomir Udriºte, 151

For more information about Dragomir, see Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, p. 263. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 217 (c. 1474), No. 218 (c. 1476-7), No. 219 (1478-9), No. 220 (c. 1482), and No. 221 (c. 1477). 152

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Fig. 11 Radu IV on behalf of Stanislav who is acused by Marco. Undated, c. 14961507. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 229. Photo: Mariana Goina.

palatine of Vlad Cãlugãrul (1482-1495), we have seven letters. This is significant evidence, given the small number of surviving letters produced at the level of the court officials. His letters touch upon a similar range of political, administrative, and personal issues.153 The letter issued by yet another Wallachian palatine, Cârstian, testifies to slightly broader types of issues in which Wallachian and Transylvanian subjects got involved.154 It seems that a Wallachian subject, Stanislav, had hired a (presumably young) Braºov inhabitant, Marco’s son, to teach him a certain language. Apparently, while he was in Wallachia Marco’s son crossed the Danube and embraced the Muslim faith. It seems that 153

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 235-No. 241. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 536. The letter was edited in 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 412 and Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 247 (c. 1496-1507). 154

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Marco regarded Stanislav as responsible for the decision taken by his son. The Wallachian prince Radu the Great (1495-1508) and his palatine issued several letters to convince the Braºov officials (who presumably made inquiries on behalf of Marco) that Stanislav was not to be held responsible. Unfortunately, the lack of survival of Braºov letters and the incomplete dates of the Wallachian letters mean that we cannot follow this case in detail. Most probably, the case was initially brought to the attention of the Wallachian palatine, as the letter he sent to Braºov includes details about the case. Possibly, after an unsuccessful attempt to convince Marco’s father, Stanislav requested the prince’s involvement in the hope that this would add weight to his testimony. Occasionally we also see a palatine in charge of dispute resolution on behalf of foreign beneficiaries. A Latin letter commissioned in 1469 for Stephanus Literatus testifies that he, while he was involved in trade exchanges, was accused of wrongdoing by four ethnic Greeks, inhabitants of Wallachia. Stephanus travelled to Târgoviºte to find his accusers and stand trial in the palatine’s court.155 In Wallachia, during the medieval period and beyond, the duties of various court and even ecclesiastical officials overlapped. A range of court officials dealt with diplomatic, trade, and administrative problems even at the international level. In the process, they seem to commission documents rather routinely. Besides the palatine, we often see chancellors and treasurers among the earliest authors of letters. They commissioned them not only in the course of their state duties, but also for their personal (trading) affairs. Some of their early letters seem to have been produced because of requests from abroad. Coico, for instance, the chancellor of Dan II, mentions in one of the earliest surviving Wallachian letters that he has issued it at the request of the Braºov officials: (...) previously I have trusted Hana and Linard and gave them my book. And they told me that they would bring me back what is mine and they will bring me a gift but they came and brought me nothing. And they came again and I did make for them a new book as was your wish and demand (...).156

The evidence often suggests that Wallachian officials commissioned documents at the request of their foreign (trade) associates. From before the mid155 156

Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 127 (15 Nov. 1469). Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 206 (1431).

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fifteenth century, however, we already see that the court officials themselves are acquainted with documentary practices. In their turn, they ask their associates for written confirmation of their oral agreements. For example, Albul, a Wallachian palatine, made this request around 1431: “(...) in order to notify me rapidly, write me a book and seal it so I can trust you (...)”.157 We see that for Albul, as presumably for other Wallachian officials, a written document was more trustworthy than an oral message. Some court officials who issued early letters, as for instance chancellor Coico, were among the few professionals of the written word of their time. This leads us to ask whether other members of the Wallachian political elite were also familiar with the culture of writing in the first half of the fifteenth century. The answer seems to be negative, as during the fifteenth century we see a restricted number of officials, mainly chancellors, palatines and treasurers, as authors of letters. After the turn of the sixteenth century, even though the authors of most of the extant letters are still palatines, chancellors, and treasurers, new court officials, such as masters of the court, constables, and cup bearers, commissioned letters.158 The matters addressed remained largely the same: administrative issues, trade, and diplomacy. Thus, we see a broadening of the range of writers of letters in sixteenth century Wallachia, even if the type of issues addressed stayed largely the same. Letters commissioned by Wallachian court officials are most often written in Slavonic. Their layout indicates that they were the work of professionals of the written word.159 Bogdan considers them less well trained than the princes’ scribes.160 The layout of boyars’ letters is slightly different from that of the princes’ letters, but we can see an internal uniformity. Most letters have neither superscription nor invocation. They feature formulae of address followed by a narration and petition. The final protocol is usually limited to a formula of greeting. The language of most letters of court officials is informal, with a hesitant choice of words and with strong traces of orality. The narration is often struc-

157

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 208 (c.1431-1433) and No. 215(c. 1433-

1440). 158

Documente ºi regeste, No. 8 (c. 1496-1508), No. 14 (c. 1530-1533), and No. 13 (1525-

1527). 159 160

See, e.g. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 516. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, p. XXVII.

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tured in the form of a dialogue, and the addressee is spoken to directly, in the second person: Good health and obeisance to my older brothers, councillors of Braºov, from Antonie. Concerning the information you have written and instructed me through jupan Lucaci, I understood it all well. But about what I had written to you, you have not answered me. Because of this, I pray you, as I have fulfilled your request before my prince and now it is done, so you shall let me know whether you are willing to do in your turn the thing I requested from you. I am your friend and I want your honour. [I wish] that this shall be done rather with you than with the others. Thus, the councillors (pârgarii) of Sighiºoara understood that I would like to place the mint (hereghia) with you, and they came to me and told me so: how do you want to place the mint at Braºov and take this honour from us and give it to them? When your prince was in trouble, Braºov citizens did not help him, but we took this task upon us, and now you want to move [the mint] there? This shame shall not fall upon us, at the price of our heads, and whatever you will ask from us, we will do. And I told them: I will do what the prince instructed me to do. And they told me this: but we shall not allow the metal to be taken out from our store room. And I told them: you are not free to deny me anything. And they answered me: wait for us from Saturday for a fortnight so that we shall send our man to the prince. I allowed them. So that, my brothers, make up your mind about these issues and do what you think more appropriate, because I wanted, and I would have liked, to be in your honour. And concerning the matter I have asked you in my former book, [I hope] you will fulfil my wish, so that both you and I shall be praised by my lord, the prince. Hasten to let me know through my servant, write in your book and seal it so that I shall trust you and I shall labour for your high honour and I shall inform my prince how much help he will receive from you so that his heart rejoices, and so that he will be full of goodwill toward you and toward your honour. And I shall also wait for those councillors [from Sighisoara] for a fortnight to see what they shall answer me. And I shall send again a mint worker, for those [men from Sighisoara] went to his place and I do not know what they told him, that he changed his mind and refuses to come. And may God bless you.161

This letter was commissioned by Antonie, treasurer of the prince’s personal income (cãmãraº) of Vlad Dracul (1437-1442), who seems to be playing the two Saxon towns off against each other in order to extract an unnamed benefit. We see in this letter, commissioned by an official, a similar pattern of communication to that in the princely letters. Information was exchanged in a combination of written and oral forms; letters were carried by trustworthy 161

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 215 (c. 1433-1440).

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messengers, who often also had to convey an oral message. Moreover, as we can see from a single letter commissioned by Antonie, many other documents were produced to solve this issue. The extant letter mentions several other letters exchanged between this Wallachian official and the town officials of Braºov and presumably Sighiºoara. Moreover, Antonie asks for a sealed document in support of their – informal – agreement, using the usual rhetoric found in Wallachian letters: “write in your book and seal it so that I can trust you”. Thus, bits and pieces of surviving evidence testify to an active exchange of information via written word at the level of state administration. The text of this letter as of many others appear to have been written under direct dictation; note the narration structured in the form of a dialogue between Antonie and his business partners. The language, as in most princely letters, is colloquial. In their external features, too, boyars’ letters written in Slavonic resemble contemporary princes’ letters. The early fifteenth-century letters are written on paper of irregular cut. The script is semi-uncial, with straight lines and few standard abbreviations. The written request for a winter coat commissioned by Voico around 1431, to give an example, is similar to prince Aldea’s letters. In contrast to princely documents, however, Voico’s request was not sealed.162 The external features of letters suggest a regularisation of writing conventions starting from the end of the fifteenth century. For example, the letters of Dragomir Udriºte, palatine of Vlad the Monk (1482-1492), are written on standard sheets of paper, sealed and folded in the same way as contemporary princely letters.163 The script is regular, with straight lines, although it often has corrections in the text of the letter, apparently made by the same scribe.164 Thus, we see in boyars’ letters a similarity to those of the princes: in subject matter, language, layout, and external characteristics. The as yet unstandardised features may be seen as an indication of immature writing practices and a utilitarian use of letters by court officials, without much concern for language or writing conventions. Only after the turn of the sixteenth century do we witness a process of standardisation of writing conventions in boyars’ letters.

162

Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 530. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 533. 164 Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 533. 163

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144 The Moldavian Evidence

In Moldavia, during the fifteenth century the number of surviving letters commissioned by court officials is even more restricted compared to Wallachia. The evidence mainly bears witness to how Moldavian boyars were engaged in writing activities as collective authors of political letters on behalf of their princes.165 Only sporadically do we see trade and administrative issues being addressed in writing by Moldavian court officials. In one of the few fifteenthcentury letters, a Moldavian treasurer writes on behalf of one of his servants to help him settle a trade-related misunderstanding. Similar to the Wallachian letters, it suggests a restricted milieu and a personal intervention.166 After the turn of the sixteenth century, we have more administrative and trade-related letters issued by Moldavian court officials. The active policies of the Moldavian prince Rareº in Transylvania are documented in 34 letters from Moldavian court officials. The majority were produced during the prince’s military campaign (1528-1530) and are preserved in the Transylvanian town archives. Letters are issued by a variety of court officials and focus on administrative and trade-related issues either on their own behalf or on that of their subjects. These letters address rather minor issues.167 After Rareº’ reigns (1527-1538, II 1541-1546), however, boyars’ letters almost disappear, with only eleven surviving from the second half of the sixteenth century. We see once again that the Moldavian evidence is strongly influenced by the pattern of survival. The relatively rich record from Rareº’ reign, together with the later evidence from the time of Michael the Brave, both preserved in archives abroad, clearly indicates that the lack of Moldavian documents cannot be taken to imply the absence of writing activities. It is unclear why the active and varied relations between Moldavia and the town of Bistriþa did not result in body of evidence comparable to that of the Wallachian letters preserved at Braºov. However, thin though it is, the evidence suggests that in Moldavia, as in Wallachia, court officials were able to exchange written information on a regular basis. In addition, the evidence suggests that the duties of Moldavian

165

See, e.g. Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 163 (1387), No. 166 (1395), and No. 182 (1433). 166 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 515 (c. 1447-1504). 167 There are, e.g. seven surviving letters issued by the Moldavian military town officials (pârcãlab), See: Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 608 (1529), No. 623 (1529), No. 645 (1529), No. 652 (1530), No. 656 (1530), No. 663 (1530), and No. 669 (1530).

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Fig. 12 Former Wallachian palatinus Voico asks Braºov traders for a coat. One of the earliest extant private letters. Undated, c. 1431. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 530. Photo: Mariana Goina.

court officials were as blurred as those of their Wallachian colleagues, and also covered a range of topics. In the course of their duties, Moldavian court officials seem to have regularly commissioned letters to deal with their personal business affairs.168 The features of the letters commissioned by the Moldavian boyars suggest a better acquaintance with writing conventions on the part of Moldavian officials.169

Personal Issues Sporadically, from the first half of the fifteenth century, we see Wallachian and Moldavian boyars, like their princes, address personal issues in their letters. They most often ask for goods from the towns of Transylvania, or for physicians.170 These letters are mainly commissioned by court officials and presumably entail a writing office and a professional scribe. Among the first surviving letters recording a personal issue is one commissioned by a Wallachian official, Voico, the palatine (vornic) of Vlad Dracul (I 1437-1442, II 14471448). In 1431 he issued a letter to persuade the Braºov urban officials to provide him with a winter coat without immediate payment. Instead of paying, Voico reminds them that he has always been their friend and promises to pay three times the price later on:

168

Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 617 (1529), No. 669 (1530), No. 810 (1543), and No. 755 (6 May 1541). 169 Cf. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner collection, No. 462 170 Documente privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 246 (c. 1496-1507).

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From jupan Voico health and prostration to my loved friends, Braºov councillors (pârgari). My dear brothers, you know well that I was your friend during the times of prince Dan, and I was your brother and I still wish to be. But you know well what hardship I am going through. So that I pray you, as God shall guide you, to help me with a textile coat and if God shall help my master, prince Vlad [to return to the throne], I shall pay for it twice or three times the price.171

Presumably, the reason for recording this request in writing was that its author, the former palatine (vornic) Voico, now in exile, considered a written document more reliable than an oral agreement, or assumed that for the Braºov officials his letter might serve as an extra argument. The fact that Voico’s written request was stored suggests that his wish was fulfilled: the winter coat was provided and the written request was kept as a receipt. Nothing is known about the outcome of his request, but Voico’s master was successful in his struggle for the throne of Wallachia and regained it twice after this request was recorded in writing.172 Another letter that records a personal request is a collective letter written on behalf of a group of Wallachian court officials. They appealed to the Braºov urban community to take care of their wives, currently refugees in Braºov.173 The surviving Moldavian evidence likewise suggests that court officials exceptionally commissioned letters to resolve personal issues. For example, the Moldavian grand palatine of the Low Country makes enquiries concerning his wife, who has taken refuge in Bistriþa during Sultan Soleiman’s attack on Moldavia (1538), and pleads for her good treatment.174 Later in the same politically unstable period, during the first reign of Rareº, another Moldavian court official, the treasurer (vistiernic) Matiiaº, sends his family to Bistriþa and asks the town officials in writing to look after them.175 The evidence of an exchange of letters between family members is limited to two letters surviving from Moldavia. They were sent in exceptional situations, again by acting or former court officials and their family members.176 This rare evidence nevertheless shows that in exceptional situations, even 171

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 207 (c. 1431). For more information about Voico see BOGDAN, Documente privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, pp. 248-249. 173 Documente ºi regeste, No. 164 (c. 1521-1526). 174 Documente Româneºti din Arhivele Bistriþei [Romanian documents from Bistriþa archives], ed. N. IORGA, 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1900), 1, No. 8. 175 Documente Româneºti din Arhivele Bistriþei, 2, No. 6. 176 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1594 (1600). 172

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when deprived of their offices and professional scribes, Wallachian and Moldavian court officials were not unfamiliar with the use of letters. They possessed a certain degree of literacy (‘quasi-illiteracy’) which allowed them to commission documents to communicate with their families. One of the two surviving letters indicates that this level of literacy was mastered not only by serving court officials but by their families and offspring as well. One of the letters was commissioned by an adopted son of a Moldavian court official, who, apparently after taking part in Michael the Brave’s campaign in Transylvania, ended up in prison at Bistriþa. He addressed his parents (still in Moldavia), begging to be rescued.177 The letter combines the regular constituent parts of a letter with very colloquial language: My reverence and wishes of good health to my parent Spiridon and to my mother Constanda. After that I let you know that until now I am alive. I have not perished, but escaped from Belgrad [Alba Iulia], when prince Michael had a war with Hungary. So that some Germans trapped me, so that they wanted to kill me. I begged them, and I told them that I am a son of Mogâldea, so that they have not killed me. From here, I have sent my book to Andriiaº from Bistriþa, he sent it to Germans and pleaded for me [for his release]. They asked for 300 taleri [golden coins], but Andiiaº released me for 100 taleri and brought me to Bistriþa. I have told them that prince Michael caught me at Hotin and brought me to Hungary. So that I pray your highness, equally as to God from the sky, not to leave me here, but strive to have me next to you, in a Christian country. Make an effort to inform my parent, palatine Mogâldea, that I lie in prison, and clay and lice eat me. And I told Andriiaº that I am a nephew and a son [of a court official], adopted in the church, through an oath. So that I pray your highness not to leave me here but release me; at least my body shall come back to my country, since I die here, longing for you. And I am getting old, and my beard has grown to my waist. And my letter shall reach you in health. By God, amen. I sign, your son Cocriºel, and I am left only with my shirt. To my parent Spiridon.178

The letter is written in Romanian. Its layout suggests a professional notary. The colloquial language and some expressions still in use in the contemporary Moldavian dialect, as for instance the expression used in the subscription, suggests that the letter was written under direct dictation.

177

For some information about Cocriºel, see Acte relative la rãzboaiele ºi cuceririle lui Mihai Viteazul, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 12, No. 1552 (1 Nov. 1600). 178 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1594 (1600).

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Fig. 13 Tricolici vornic, a Moldavian palatinus, writes from prison to his family. Undated, c. 1477. Braºov, State Archives, POB, no. 516. Photo: Mariana Goina.

The letter of palatine Tricolici (Fig. 13) is another instance of missives exchanged between family members in medieval Moldavia. Tricolici writes from prison, worried about the well-being of his cows and horses and urging his family to stop quarrelling over his wealth as long as he is still alive. Here, as in Crocisel’s letter, the external features and layout suggest a professional scribe, while its caring words suggest that the letter was written under direct dictation of Tricolici. ***

The evidence of letters suggests that in Moldavia, as in Wallachia, the exchange of letters was almost always restricted to the institutional level. Even letters with personal requests were usually written in institutions and addressed

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to institutions. The layout of the boyars’ letters indicate that almost without exceptions they were written by professionals of the written word.

Charters The second type of surviving pragmatic documents produced at the level of the regional institutions and the high-ranking court officials are records of land transactions. Charters issued at this level come late in the evidence, especially in Moldavia. In Wallachia, boyars’ charters are attested from the end of the fifteenth century, while in Moldavia such records survive only from the last two decades of the sixteenth century. The range of court officials who commissioned them can be unexpected. For instance, among their authors we find chamberlains. Sometimes the wives or widows of court officials or former court officials commission records of land endowments or transactions. Many of the surviving early Wallachian charters suggest that the writing services provided by court officials were restricted to family members and clients. Later on, especially after the mid-sixteenth century, court officials issued charters on behalf of a more diverse social pool.

The Wallachian Evidence The Wallachian charters commissioned by court officials are very limited in number (c. 65 survive). The first extant Wallachian charter issued outside of the princely chancery was produced in the historical province of Oltenia, whose senior official, the great ban of Oltenia, held the most important state office, second only to that of the prince.179 We see that up to the mid-sixteenth century charters issued in the ban’s office mostly record the ban’s own or his family’s donations of land to ecclesiastical institutions or to servants. One of the earliest charters (c. 1494) commissioned by the Wallachian ban is a personal endowment made by ban Barbul to his foundation, Bistriþa monastery.180 179 V.A. GEORGESCU and O. SACHELARIE, Judecata domneascã în Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova (1611-1831) [Trial before the prince in Wallachia and Moldavia (1611-1831)], 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1979), 1, p. 67. 180 The charter is not dated; modern editors have dated it to some time prior to March 16, 1494. See DRH B, 1, No. 245.

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Barbul, one of the highly influential Craioveºti brothers, donated several villages to the family monastery of Bistriþa. The evidence testifies that the ban’s charters, like monastic and urban ones, had only limited legal value. They had to be confirmed in the office of the prince. We see that, despite the special status of Oltenia province and of his head, the Craiova ban, Barbul’s charter was soon confirmed by a charter of the current prince, Vlad the Monk (1482-1495), which was presumably commissioned by the beneficiary of the ban’s donation, Bistriþa monastery.181 The princely charter is evidence that the ban’s charter was not perceived by the monastic institution as sufficient legal proof. Another of the ban’s charters was issued on behalf of one of his servants, Arca, who was in debt to the ban to the tune of 600 pieces of lard that he had been asked to sell. Unable to return either lard or money, he borrowed money from his brother and guaranteed the loan with a landed estate. The charter confirming the landed estate to Arca’s brother was issued in the office of Arca’s patron, the ban of Craiova.182 The brother, following the practice of monastic institutions, requested a further confirmation of the ban’s record and commissioned a princely charter.183 Half a century later, the richer surviving record of charters produced in the ban’s office suggests that land records had begun to be issued at the request of boyars who were not part of the ban’s court. On closer scrutiny, however, we notice networks of client-patron relationships among the commissioners or beneficiaries of the ban’s charters. For instance, a charter commissioned by Badea, master of the court (clucer), and recorded in the ban’s office happens to record an endowment to Bistriþa monastery, whose patrons were the powerful Craioveºti family which provided a string of bans.184 It seems that the production of land records at the level of the ban was chiefly carried out to serve the interests of the ban’s network of clients. Besides the ban, other Wallachian court officials are also recorded as commissioners of charters. Not surprisingly, one of the first documents was issued by the head of the Wallachian chancery, Radul, who confirmed a land donation made by his father-in-law to Tismana Monastery.185

181

DRH B,

182

DRH B,

2, No. 246 (1494, March 16). 4, No. 205 (undated). 183 DRH B, 4, No. 206. 184 DRH B, 4, No. 184 (1545, July 25). 185 DRH B, 4, No. 225, (undated; dated by modern editors to 1547).

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Other court officials, such as chamberlains, are also recorded as commissioners of charters. Chamberlains Barbu and Vladislav, for example, recorded in writing the sale of the landed estate of their mother, the noblewoman Stanca: Jupan Barbul and Stanciul chamberlains (postelnici) and their grandsons, Vintilã, son of Stanciul, and Socol, son of Hamza, write this book of ours for our servant named Vuia and his sons so that he can hold an estate at Bohani, a quarter of the entire part, of forest and plain and mills and vines and of everything because our mother, jupâniþa Stanca sold it for 5000 silver coins when our brothers Hamza and Stanciul and Vladul and Drãghici had perished. She sold her land in order to pay for the religious services for her dead sons as it is becoming for dead boyars. For this reason, we gave this estate to Vuia, our servant, to him and his sons. If somebody of our kin shall destroy this donation of ours, he shall be cursed by 318 Holy Fathers from Nicaea and he shall stay next to Judas and those infidel Jews who shouted over our Christ “take Him, take him and crucify Him”, His blood shall be on them, and on their sons. And witnesses are: jupan Dumitru, ban from Vâlcãneºti, and Calotã ban from Gradiºte, and Laºco, ban, and Pãtru from Giurgiþa, and Bogdan from Bezdina, and Radul from Brãtivoeºti, and Stan from Obârºie, and scribe Stanciul from Tãtãrãi and Miclea vãtah from Deleni, and chancellor Ban. And me, Ivaºco from Loviºte, from Boiºoara wrote; August month, 29 days, in the year 7085 (1577).186

We constantly see the same pattern: charters issued by court officials were produced to record land transactions on behalf of family members and personal servants. Note that the chamberlain’s charter was written by a professional scribe, as Ivaºco from Loviºte (Ivaºco din Liviºte) is recorded among the princely chancery scribes of the period. However, we see that professional scribes used a different template for charters issued outside the princely chancery. Quite extensive maledictions are mentioned in this charter, maledictions that are not usually recorded in laymen’s charters of the period. Not only court officials and former court officials but their immediate family members, especially wives and widows, were active commissioners of charters as well.187 As with other types of documents, we see that it was not gender but status that made the difference where literacy was concerned. For example, Stanca, the “palatina” (“vorniceasã”) as she calls herself – widow of a former grand palatine – along with her children commissions a charter to

186

DRH B,

187

DIR B,

8, No. 93. 5, No. 414 (1589).

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152 Fig. 14 Deed of jupanita Stanca palatina, wife of Danciul, former palatinus, on behalf of her servant Alexie. 12 February 1598. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 1637. Photo: Mariana Goina.

record a family endowment for the benefit of a servant, Alexie, as a reward for his faithful service: In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit, amen! I, jupaniþa Stanca, palatine’s wife (vorniceasã) of jupan Danciul, former grand palatine, and jupan Calotã ban and his noble wife (jupâniþa) Calea, and their brothers, chamberlains (postelnici) Barbul and Matei; we endowed our servant, namely Alexie with half of the estate from Hãrvãteºti, as much as it can be divided from the upper and lower part, because we bequeathed this estate for our servant’s faithful service which he carried out for our father, jupan Danciul palatine (vornic), for his rightful service in foreign countries and bloodshed and honest service; he also has served us all. And for this, they shall hold the landed estate as a bequest with their grandsons and great-grandsons forever. Who shall destroy our bequest and our endowment, he shall be blamed by 318 Fathers of Nicaea and shall be near Judas and Arius. Written in the month of February, 12 days, in the year 7106 (1598).188

It seems that the endowment was recorded in writing after the former grand palatine Danciul departed this life. Again, as in the case of letters, we see 188

DRH B,

11, No. 273 (1598).

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women commissioning documents only after their husbands or fathers passed away. We may assume this was the main reason for their involvement into the commissioning of documents. It is unclear who wrote this charter, as no scribe is mentioned. On the one hand, the use of the Slavonic language suggests a professional scribe, as Wallachian parish priests usually write their records in Romanian, but on the other hand the full invocation and religious sanctions suggest a monastic scribe. After the mid-sixteenth century, the evidence of charters issued by court officials becomes richer. They are also issued in the interests of broader social groups. Among the beneficiaries of court officials’ charters we find free peasants, parish priests, boyars, clerics, and monastic institutions.189

The Moldavian Evidence In Moldavia, as far as we can discern from the available evidence, it seems that the princely chancery provided writing services almost exclusively for members of the upper nobility. Up to the end of the sixteenth century, free village communities are not recorded as beneficiaries of princely charters. It seems that land conveyances made by smaller landholders were usually recorded in the offices of local officials. Charters issued by the Moldavian palatines are among the first to be attested.190 The two Moldavian palatines (mare vornic), of the high and low areas of the country, were in charge of administrative and judicial matters, and their responsibilities are often reflected in the charters they commission: (...) And I, Bucium the grand palatine (mare vornic). I gave this book of mine to these men, namely Necora and ªtefan from the village of Murgeºti on Crasna. So that they shall be strong to hold the share of the estate [formerly] belonging to Ionaºco Boboc, grandson of the priest Murgu because Ionaºco Boboc killed a man and that man passed away and Necoarã and ªtefan paid for [ransomed] his head from me; Ionaºco Boboc did not have any means to redeem his head but ran away. So that it shall be known that they [Necoarã and ªtefan] had given me 12 oxen, so that nobody out of his kin can claim his [Ionaºco Boboc’s] share of the estate since his brothers Marco and Petrea had been here before me but had no power [means] 189

DRH B, 4, No. 184; DRH B, 6, No. 151; DRH B, 8, No. 90; DRH B, 11, No. 132, No. 288, and

No. 343. 190

DIR A,

4, No. 173, No. 293.

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to pay for his head. And we made this letter of ours so that they shall hold that landed estate, Boboc’s share, in peace. And if somebody out of his [Boboc’s] kin shall wish to take back the estate, they shall return to Necoarã and ªtefan those twelve oxen and three gold coins for boots. And if nobody from his kin shall be able to return what they had paid, they and their sons shall hold that estate in perpetuity. And this I write and testify with my letter so that it shall be known. And I, Ghiorghie chancellor (logofãtul) wrote this letter with my hand. In the year 7096 (1588), April 15.191

The palatine’s charter was written in Romanian, although its scribe was, according to his identification – surprisingly – a professional scribe. The evidence suggests that by the end of the sixteenth century a range of Moldavian court officials possessed writing offices and professional scribes. Moreover, their charters record land conveyances not only for their immediate family and servants but also for a broader segment of smaller landholders. For instance, Ghiorgie and Frâncescul, constables of Hotin, recorded in writing a land purchase on behalf of priest Roman from Hotin. He appears to have purchased rather a small estate, a third part of a third part of the village of Bârnova, from Druþea neamiº (a member of the minor nobility) of ªendreni and his sister Achilina.192 The charter commissioned by Hotin’s constables was written by scribe Fedor, who, judging by the layout and language of his note, seems to be a professional scribe. The procedure recorded in some officials’ charters shows that the parties involved in land conveyance went before a court official to carry out and record their land transaction. By the end of the sixteenth century, it seems that even the intra-family conveyances of smaller landowners were recorded in writing, albeit not in the princely office but by local officials.193 Their charters were, it appears, usually written in the offices of local court officials. Seemingly, in Moldavia even the lower nobility was capable of issuing written records.194

191

DRH A,

192

DRH A,

8, No. 265 (1588). 8, No. 291 (1588). 193 DRH A, 6, No. 123 and No. 170 (1587). 194 DIR A, 4, No. 327 and No. 179.

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Land Records Issued outside Institutions In Moldavia and Wallachia, we see few documents being issued outside institutions during the medieval period. When we do find them, and this is usually after the mid-sixteenth century, they are generally limited to records of land ownership. Land records of this type do not record a state or urban official as their commissioner. They are written in the name of the beneficiary, often in the first person. The procedure may require, however, especially in Moldavia, that the land transaction registered in the note be witnessed by a court official.195 We often find state, ecclesiastical, and urban officials among Moldavian witnesses: I, Dumitra, Turcu’s daughter, granddaughter and great granddaughter of Fedoºca, freely and by nobody forced and pressed, I have sold my rightfully inherited landed estate, the sixth part of the third part of the village of Cerlena. I have sold this to my grandson Dumitru Gînscã for 95 counted silver coins. And this bargain was witnessed by vãtah Volocon and scribe Isac, and by vãtah Borodavici, and by scribe Miron and Griga Roºca. And scribe Isac wrote it with his hand. And Volocon vãtah sealed this deed with his seal. In the year 7095 (1587), 4 July.196

In Moldavia, the first surviving deed dates from the reign of Alexandru Lãpuºneanu (1552-1561, II 1564-1568),197 while in Wallachia the earliest deed is dated 1560.198 Their occurrence is rare, especially in Moldavia. For instance, from the two reigns of Lãpuºneanu only one deed has come down to us.199 Although more are attested in Wallachia, their number still does not exceed a couple of dozen.200 Most survive in late monastic registers. In the Wallachian and Moldavian evidence this type of record is usually referred to as zapis (‘note’).201 In Wallachia they can also sometimes be called rãvaº.202 The internal forms of deeds can vary. Many are written in the third person, as for instance: 195

DIR A, 3, No. 9, No. 49, and No. 309; Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, No. 60, No. 61, No. 80, No. 81, and No. 85. 196 DIR A, 3, No. 9, No. 13. 197 DRH A, 6, No. 109, undated (c. 1553-1561). 198 DRH B, 5, No. 167 (1560). 199 DRH A, 6, No. 109, undated (c. 1553-1561). 200 See, e.g. DRH B, 5, No. 167 (1560); DRH B, 6, No. 23 (1567) and No. 191 (1570). 201 See, e.g. DIR A, 3, No. 309 and No. 471; DIR A, 4, No. 8. 202 DRH B, 7, No. 106.

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Notice (zapis) for a landed estate bought by Necula Þiganu from the village of Bãloteºti, the third part out of the fifth part, and they bought it from Toma from there and from Stana his sister (...).203

The social status of beneficiaries of deeds is often unspecified. Frequently, documents mention only the Christian names of the beneficiaries and (presumably) the Christian names of their ancestors, either male or female, from whom the land was inherited, and their places of residence. 204 The small size of the estates involved in the transactions suggests that many deeds were written on behalf of members of free village communities and lower boyars.205 The lack of any mention of the status of the beneficiary may also point to a lowly status. Sporadically, however, among the beneficiaries of deeds we come across members of the political elite such as palatines, chancellors, and chamberlains: Note (zapis) how Chineajna, sister of Anghelina, willingly and by nobody pressed, nor forced, bargained and sold her rightful inherited estate, half of the village of Rus, to the chamberlain (pârcãlab) of Cotnar and to her sister Anghelina, Lady (cneaghina) of chamberlain Goia. And the chamberlain of Cotnar, Goia, and his Lady Anghelina, sister of Chineajna, paid the entire amount and gave 375 golden coins (zloþi) in front of Ieremia, chief overseer (mare vãtav) of the county of Suceava, their uncle, and before Ion the cupbearer (ceaºnic), son of Zbiare, grand palatine (mare vornic), and before Blaj, former constable (pârcãlab) of Cotnar and before Eremia, mayor (ªoltuz), and before 12 councillors (pârgari), who were exercising their duties. And Eremia, chief overseer, of the county of Suceava, their uncle, and Ionaºco cupbearer, and Blaj former constable sealed this note. Written at Cotnar in the year 7077 (1569).206

It is unclear why chamberlain Goia commissioned a local deed for the land he bought. Possibly the choice of this specific type of document may have been made because it cost less, as these deeds often seem to have been written by non-professional scribes or by priests. It is not unlikely that it was later confirmed, or intended to be confirmed, by a princely charter. An alternative explanation for Goia’s choice of a locally issued charter may hinge on the circumstance that this was a family transaction: one sister sold her share to the other sister, married to chamberlain Goia, in the presence of their uncle and of 203

DRH A,

204

DRH A,

6, No. 109. 6, No. 363 (1569); for Wallachia, see DRH B, 8, No. 284 (1580). 205 DRH B, 7, No. 4 (1571). 206 DRH A, vol. 6, No. 426 (1569).

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several other officials. Intra-family land transactions recorded in writing were a new phenomenon: they usually show up in the extant record only after the middle of the sixteenth century. Prior to this, several generations would document their landed estates by using an ancestor’s charter that was handed down within the family. Records produced by parish priests, like early princely charters, are less formulaic. Thanks to the additional details they give, we can see that at least some land transactions took place as a consequence of economic hardship. Priest Andonie from Câldeºti, for instance, specifies that he heard and witnessed a transaction for an impoverished chamberlain’s family who sold their estates to a family member, palatine (vornic) Bantaº, out of distress and poverty.207 The language, external features, and layout of deeds provide evidence that the degree of training of their writers varied. In some cases, scribes record their name and function, from which we learn that deeds could be written by professional scribes as well as by village priests.208 In Wallachia, the great majority of surviving deeds are written in Romanian. In the few instances in which names and some information about scribes are mentioned, we find that it was mainly parish priests who acted as notaries at the village level. The external features and layout of their records testify to non-standardised written practices:209 I, Neguiþã, daughter of Filip of Vlad of Bangica, next to my husband, with Ilie, I sold to Iancu and his brothers, Preda and Jâte and Radul four places [estates], two out of Necãturã, two from Crivina Calului for 340 ready money (bani gata). And those [estates] from Crivina are located head to head [one next to another]. And when I had sold these places, I asked all my brothers and all my relatives and all my village neighbours; Preda of Henþa, and Pârvul of Dãnãilã, and Mirce and Iancul of Neche and Preda of Potircã testified. And to confirm this, we put our fingers. I Neguiþã, I Preda, Mirce; in the year 7088 [1579-1580], Ile, Iancul, and again Preda.210

207

Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 66. Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 83 (1592). 209 For more information about external features and layout of early deeds, written in Romanian, see A. MAREª, “Introduction”, in: Documente ºi insemnãri româneºti, pp. 35-46. 210 Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 6. 208

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158 Fig. 15 Deed from Wallachia (zapis). Dragoi sells his landed estate. Undated, c. 1596. Braºov, State Archives, S. I. No. 1590. Photo: Mariana Goina.

There are significant differences between Moldavian private documents, usually written in the assured hand of a trained scribe, and those from Wallachia, more often written by local priests. One of the main differences between the two types of land records is the language: professional scribes usually wrote their deeds in Slavonic, while village priests often used the vernacular language. Another distinction between Moldavian and Wallachian deeds is that fingerprints instead of seals are often used in Wallachia. The language of the vernacular documents testifies to a transitional period, as we can find many Slavonic formulas and linking words in these early Romanian documents. This may suggest that village priests received only a basic training in Slavonic and afterwards turned to the more accessible vernacular language. Local records were written in the private houses of the landowners involved in the transaction or in those of their scribes. As the documents testify, outside the administrative institutions there was no notary’s office for the recording of documents either in towns or in villages.211 A document written in Iaºi in 1593 indicates that the land conveyance was carried out and recorded in

211

DIR A,

3, No. 306.

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the house of “Titiana from Iaºi”.212 At the village level, too, scribes of documents often mention that the land transaction was carried out at the beneficiary’s house, in the house of the local priest, or in some layman’s house.213 Some land records issued by the Moldavian palatines indicate as their places of record the episcopal headquarters, apparently being used as a notary’s office.214 Only later on, in the seventeenth century, were specific notaries’ offices established.215 Like all other land records issued outside the princely office, these deeds specify that their legal value is temporary in nature and that the transaction will need to be confirmed by a princely charter:216 (...) before good neighbours from above and below the estate and before all the people from the church of Bujoreani who saw it with their own eyes. And witnessing their agreement and payment of 2000 silver coins, Stoica and Gherasim bought that part of Bogdan and of Þiganca and of Maria, sons of Dragoº Teleagã, to be their estate with the entire income both from the plain and from the hills. This deed was written in the days of prince Petru (...). They shall keep this deed until they shall make a higher charter. [Son] of Pãtraºcu from Bujoreani wrote.217

We have reasons to assume that these temporary deeds were discarded after princely charters were secured. The evidence gives us numerous clues about deeds being lost or discarded. For instance, Ignat ªuºcala from the village of Nicoreni sold a landed estate that he had earlier bought from Bãlaci. His deed was apparently written by a village notary (Vasile Mãrian) and sealed by the fingerprints of the lay persons who witnessed the land conveyance. The deed mentions that, also earlier on, when Ignat ªuºcala bought the same piece of land he was now selling, a deed had been issued: “I have sold a piece of land, that I had formerly brought from Bãlaci (...) as much as can be divided according to my deed (zapis)”.218 The former deed was no longer extant by the time of the second transaction. 212

4, No. 117. For Moldavia: DIR A, 4, No. 38, No. 170; for Wallachia: Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, No. 5. 214 DIR A, 3, No. 411. 215 GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova pînã la Constantin Mavrocordat”, pp. 129-231. 216 The first part of the deed is missing. 217 DRH A, 7, No. 74 (dated by the editors to the reign of Petru Rareº, c. 1574-1591). 218 DIR A, 3, No. 421 (25 March 1587). 213

DIR A,

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The extant evidence suggests that after the mid-sixteenth century, small landowners often commissioned documents to record their landed estates. Especially in the last decades of the century, in Wallachia the number of deeds, like that of other land records, rises sharply. In Moldavia, too, half of all surviving deeds were issued during the last decade of the sixteenth century. We see that around the last quarter of the sixteenth century there was a higher demand for written records. ***

To sum up, the surviving evidence suggests that the production of letters remained largely limited to institutional settings. It seems restricted to highranking court, urban, and ecclesiastical officials. The range of issues commonly addressed in writing suggests that, for them, the exchange of information in writing was almost routine. Later on, these same officials began to issue land records, initially for their families and clients, and later for a broader segment of society. The territorial nobility only rarely appears involved in the process of writing. In the last decades of the sixteenth century, we encounter them chiefly as commissioners of deeds. The evidence is also silent about the exchange of letters among private individuals. The treasurer of prince Rareº, Mateiaº, wanting to inquire about the fate of his family, who had taken refuge in Bistriþa, addressed the officials of that town.219 Only among urban communities do we see exchanges of letters outside the administrative institutions.220 The evidence of the charters indicates that they were initially commissioned almost entirely by the same groups of court officials whom we met commissioning letters. After the mid-sixteenth century, we have clear evidence that the production of written records extended down to the village level. Local land records could be written by professional scribes, but also by village priests. The features of these deeds show that village priests had mastered only basic writing skills. Their documents, often issued in the vernacular, testify that the use of Romanian as a language of record smoothed the use of written documents at the village level.

219 220

534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 518 (undated). Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 134 (1472) and No. 690 (1534).

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The Technical Literacy of Authors of Documents Any discussion of the technical literacy of the authors of the documents is a hazardous business. Apart from princes’ and boyars’ manu propria signatures, inconclusive as these are, we have hardly any direct evidence.221 What we do have suggests that “the beginnings of written culture in a hitherto oral society were at first confined to professional literates employed by the political elite and then spread to that elite itself”.222 We find that in Wallachia and Moldavia, as often elsewhere as well, besides the urban milieu involved in trade and various crafts, writing skills are first recorded among princes and high court officials. The first extant princely signatures are attested no earlier than the second half of the sixteenth century. Presumably the use of a signature as a mark of a document’s authenticity, a practice which became established in sixteenthcentury Europe, had its belated echo in the practices of the Wallachian and Moldavian chanceries.223 The first surviving autograph documents and notes belong to princes and high court officials exposed to foreign cultural milieus, such as Petru ªchiopul, prince of Moldavia (I 1574-1577, II 1578-1579, III 1582-1591), Mihai Viteazul, the Movilã brothers, and chancellor Stroici.224 The richest surviving collection of autograph princely documents is connected with Petru ªchiopul, who grew up abroad, in Constantinople, and came to the Moldavian throne as an adult. As always, the chances of preservation have to be taken into account as a factor here as well, as his personal archives survived outside Wallachia and Moldavia.225 The peculiar orthography of the Romanian used in the notes and documents of Petru ªchiopul leads us to believe they 221

For more information about the authenticity of signatures on medieval documents see A. ADAMSKA, “Some preliminary remarks about royal literacy in the late Middle Ages”, in: Hofkultur der Jagiellonendynastie und verwandter Fürstenhäuser, ed. U. BORKOWSKA and M. HÖRSCH (Ostfildern, 2010), pp. 153-169, at p. 156; for instances of surviving signatures, see DIR A, 4, No. 43 (c. 1591-1592). 222 M. MANN, The Sources of Social Power: A History of Power from the beginning to A.D. 1760, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1986), 1, p. 193. 223 Cf. A. GIRY, Manuel de diplomatique (Paris, 1925), quoted by H.H. STAHL, Manual de Paleografie slavo-românã (Bucharest, 1936), p. 44. 224 E.g. Petru ªchiopu, prince of Moldavia (I 1574-1577, II (1578-1579, III (1582-1591)) and his brother Alexandru II Mircea, prince of Wallachia (1568-1574), sons of Mircea Ciobanul (I (1545-1552), II (1553-1554), III (1558-1559)), grew up abroad; for more information, see Domnia ºi viaþa lui Petru Vodã ªchiopul, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 11. 225 Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, No. 30; Petru Schiopul died at Bozen in 1594 and his personal archive is preserved in the Österreichisches Staatsarchiv in Vienna.

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were written by the prince himself.226 His autograph documents are always written in Romanian; even one of his letters addressed to Ferdinand II, archduke of Austria (1529-1595), was written in that language.227 His peculiar way of recording the sounds of the Romanian language leads Mareº to regard his mastery of Romanian as only partial.228 By contrast, the autograph documents of the Moldavian prince Ieremia Movilã (1595-1600) – who spent part of his life in Poland – prove his mastery of writing skills in both Polish and Slavonic.229 The short reigns and frequent falls from power of the rulers of Wallachia and Moldavia were followed by the emigration of nobles belonging to parties discontented with or in danger from the new prince. And as Iorga puts it, “there were always many unhappy boyars in the kaleidoscopic movements of princes”.230 Consequently, the children of Wallachian and Moldavian boyars often grew up abroad and some presumably attended schools there, as we see in the case of ªtefan, the son of Petru ªchiopul. Indirect testimony also suggests that it was a common practice of Wallachian and Moldavian princes to send their offspring abroad. For example, Mircea the Old (1386-1418) had grown up at the court of the king of Hungary. Similarly, his son, Vlad Þepeº (1456-1562), stayed for some time at the court of John Hunyadi, as did the future Stephen the Great (1457-1504).231 Unfortunately, we have only patchy and indirect information about the extent to which the Moldavian and Wallachian political elite went abroad to be educated.232 Relations between the Moldavian political elite and Poland are slightly better documented, but we seldom know where early Moldavians attended school. Even the place of education of well-known Moldavian literates from the end of the sixteenth century, people such as Luca Stroici, is still the subject of debate.233 There is a list of names of the inhabitants of Moldavia who 226

For the edition of autograph documents belonging to Petru chiopul, see Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, No. 98, No. 99, No. 100. 227 Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, No. 100 (1594); The original of the letters is to be found in the Austrian State Archives at Vienna, Fond Turcica 1, No. 58 (1586), Miscellanea Turcica collection f. 82-83. 228 MAREª, “Introduction”, in: Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, p. 31. 229 Ibid. 230 IORGA Istoria literaturii române în secolul al 18-lea, 2nd edn., 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1919), 1, p. 19. 231 DRH D, 1, No. 53. 232 N. IORGA, Istoria literaturii române în secolul al 18-lea, 1, p. 17. 233 G. FRANCK, “Un mare ctitor-boier: Luca Stroici” [A great boyar and founder of monasteries:

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attended the Universities of Cracow and Prague during the fifteenth century, but their names suggests them as belonging to the German urban communities.234 Richer information is available only from the beginning of the seventeenth century onwards. The practice of sending children abroad to be educated is mentioned in seventeenth-century Moldavian narratives.235 Specific knowledge and skills acquired by the authors of chronicles, such as their ability to use Latin, suggest that they were among those Moldavian pupils who attended schools in Poland. For instance, the author of the first Moldavian chronicle to be written in the vernacular, Grigorie Ureche, seems to have grown up in Poland. His knowledge of Polish historiography, of the chronicle tradition, and of a range of languages suggests that he was educated there. He would appear to have emigrated to Poland with his father at an early age, after prince Petru Cazacul (c. 1592) was deposed from the Moldavian throne by Aron the Tyrant (I 1591-2, II 1592-1595). In fact, it seems that the practice of sending children to Poland for their education was not uncommon among well-off Moldavians. The Moldavian chancellor Luca Stroici wrote the Polish chancellor Zamoysky a letter of gratitude for arranging for his son to be released from prison. We may guess that the young Stroici had infringed some Polish law while studying abroad.236 Later on, our information suggests the spread of the practice of an education abroad to Moldavian town dwellers. The son of a certain honest citizen of Iaºi, Petrus Valachus, was sent to Lviv for his education and perished there.237 The reference to his father as “Petru Wallachus from Iaºi” and the lack of any specific status may suggest Petru was a member of the urban community, possibly a merchant. There is also evidence pointing to the practice of sending children abroad to learn various trades. One of the earliest attestations is a letter issued in 1436 by the Moldavian Prince Iliaº on behalf of a tailor from the town of Roman,

Luca Stroici], in: Confesiune ºi culturã în Evul Mediu: In Honorem Ion Toderaºcu, ed. B.-P. Maleon and A.F. PLATON (Iaºi, 2004), pp. 295-6. 234 MANOLESCU, “Cultura orãºeneascã în Moldova în a doua jumãtate a secolului al cincisprezecelea”, pp. 80-81. 235 Letopiseþul Þãrii Moldovei [The chronicle of the Moldavian Country], ed. T. CELAC (Chiºinãu, 1990), p. 195. 236 Documente privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 290 (30 Sept. 1599). 237 “Documente ale Mitropoliei din Iaºi” [Documents of the Iaºi Diocese], in: Studii ºi documente cu privire la istoria Românilor, ed. N. IORGA, 31 vols. (Bucharest, 1909-1916), 5, No. 25.

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who sent his son to Braºov “ad docendum rasoriam artem”.238 The name of the letter’s beneficiary (Johannes) identifies him as belonging to the German ethnic group. Unfortunately, the evidence is thin. Presumably because the practice of sending children abroad for ‘fostering’ seems to have been based on private and oral agreements, documents would appear to have been resorted to only in exceptional situations. Little is known about Wallachian and Moldavian schools during our period. We can only assume that the monastic schools attested during the seventeenth century had originated earlier on. Most of the earliest attestations of schools in Moldavia date from the second half of the sixteenth century. They seem to have been linked to the Reformation and Counter-Reformation movements, both brought to Moldavia by foreign princes. For example, the first attested Moldavian school in Cotnari was founded by despot Voda (15611563), a Protestant prince of foreign origin. It seems that the school was attended by a small number of pupils selected from all over the country.239 On the other side of the divide, the Jesuits founded a Latin school in Iaºi.240 These early schools were separated by great distances and seem to have functioned sporadically at best. Several attestations of a dascãl (‘teacher’) suggest domestic studying of basic skills may have occurred as well. Princes and boyars may have hired private teachers for the education of their offspring. For instance, the Moldavian prince Petru ªchiopu indicates in his will the amount to be paid to the private tutor of his son Stephen.241 The Christian names of scribes who signed as ‘teacher’ (dascãl) suggest that they were laymen.242 The kinship relations found among professional scribes active in the Moldavian and Wallachian princely chanceries also suggest domestic schooling of noble pupils. However, 238

Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 200 (9 June 1436). For a contemporary (although patchy) description of the Cotnari school, see Johann Sommer, Vita Jakobi Despotae Moldavorum reguli, ed. and trans. M. HOLBAN, in: Cãlãtori strãini în Þãrile Române, 2, p. 261. See also M. CRÃCIUN, “Protestantism and Orthodoxy in sixteenth-century Moldavia”, in: The Reformation in Eastern and Central Europe (Aldershot, 1997), pp. 126-135; M. CRÃCIUN and O. GHITTA, Church and Society in Central and Eastern Europe (Cluj Napoca, 1998). 240 V. GEORGESCU, The Romanians: A History, ed. and trans. M. CALINESCU, 2nd edn. (Columbus, Ohio, 1984), p. 61 241 Domnia ºi viaþa lui Petru Vodã ªchiopul, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 12, No. 685 (30 Apr. 1602); Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 99 (1594). 242 In 1475, e.g. we have a certain scribe who signs as “Ion dascãl” (“John the teacher”). DRH A, 2, No. 199 and No. 201. 239

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it is hard to assess how widespread the practice was among the nobility. Petru ªchiopu could have been an exception, as he had grown up in a more literate cultural milieu. On the other hand, one may argue that his archives benefited from especially favourable storage conditions, and that it is possible that the practice was more widespread than the evidence suggests. The evidence of the seventeenth century seems to confirm the latter assumption. Anton-Maria del Chiaro Florentino, writing about early seventeenth-century Wallachia, mentions as a matter of fact the institution of private tutoring of the offspring of Wallachian princes and boyars.243 However, we should bear in mind Drake’s assessment that no more than two per cent of the secular population possessed active writing skills by the end of the eighteenth century. This suggests that in the sixteenth century technical literacy will not have been very common even among boyars.244 The evidence provides almost no information about the technical literacy skills of members of the political elite, or about their putative schooling during the sixteenth century. The only safe conclusion we can draw is, that the earliest Wallachian and Moldavian members of the political elite who were literate grew up and were educated abroad. It is likewise difficult to assess the technical literacy skills among the urban trading communities. While secondary evidence points consistently to merchants having possessed activity-based writing skills so that they could keep personal archives and exchange information in writing, few personal documents originating with merchants survive. Given the specific cultural context of an age in which the skill of reading did not automatically mean the skill of writing, and knowledge of how to write did not involve writing itself, it is very hard to draw any firm conclusions about the spread of technical literacy among the Wallachian and Moldavian elite. Whether they acquired knowledge of reading and writing, and, if so, to what extent they saw fit to write documents themselves as long as they had others to do this for them, will remain unknown.245 A merchant from Ragusa, trading at Bucharest, asked for more discretion as apparently the reading of his letters was done by a professional scribe (“as the reading is done by Ioan”).246 Later, 243 A.-M. DEL CHIARO FLORENTINO, Revoluþiile Valahiei, ed. C.C. SOLOMON, 2nd edn. (Iaºi, 2005), pp. 45, 69. 244 A. DRACE-FRANCIS, The Making of Modern Romanian Culture: Literacy and the Development of National Identity (London, 2005). 245 Cf. D.M. LEWIS, “The Persepolis Tablets: speech, seal and script”, in: Literacy and Power in the Ancient World, pp. 17-32, at p. 18. 246 N. IORGA, Scrisori de negustori [Letters issued by traders] (Bucharest, 1925), No. 20

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we can be certain only of the ability of the Wallachian and Moldavian elite to commission documents (‘quasi-illiteracy’) to render their administrative as well as private activities easier.247 The physical features of their letters confirm that they were almost always written by professionals of the written word.

(1587). 247

Cf. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, pp. 40-41.

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Moldavian and Wallachian Chancery Scribes n what follows, I turn to the professional literates active in the princely chanceries in the first centuries after the founding of the two principalities, tracing their social origins, age, family relations, and levels of education. For the later period, in which professional literates were more available at the regional, urban, and village levels, I will also inquire into the identity of local scribes. The surviving evidence from Wallachia and Moldavia with regard to the early professionals of the written word is very uneven. While in Moldavia the earliest data already suggest a pattern of employment in the central princely office of a high-status group of kin-related clerks, in Wallachia, due to numerous inconsistencies in the practices of the first princes’ offices, it is hard to draw general conclusions about the early scribes or about the functioning of the chancery. After the turn of the sixteenth century, however, when the Wallachian data are more favourable to the researcher, we see that the early Moldavian model can be discerned in the neighbouring principality as well. The first surviving charters already suggest that the personnel employed in the princely writing offices were laymen of high social standing. Writing seems to have been a family enterprise during this early period, as kinship relations between employees of the princely offices are observable. This practice seems at odds with the evidence surviving from many European areas, where early scribes were clerics and the earliest surviving charters were produced in religious houses.1 By contrast, in Wallachia and Moldavia the Church seems only

I

1 Cf. W. DAVIES and P. FOURACRE, “Conclusion”, in: The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe, pp. 207-240, at p. 210.

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Fig. 16 Endowment of Neamþ monastery by Alexandru the Good; charter written by Bratei. 7 November 1409. Bucharest, National Archives-C, Mãnãstrirea Neamþ 21/1. Photo Mariana Goina.

indirectly engaged in the production of early charters, as their commissioners. Only later, during the sixteenth century, did priests begin to play a more active role in the production of land charters, both as employees in the princely chanceries and individually, as notaries acting at the village level.

The Moldavian Evidence The first mention of scribes working in Moldavia suggests that the early scribes of the princely offices were of foreign origin. Their names (Goian, Iatzco, Tamash, Bratei) imply Ruthenian or Polish origins.2 Native scribes seem to appear in the Moldavian chancery from the reign of Alexandru the Good onwards.3 2

N. IORGA “Cat de veche e scoala la români?” [How early we can speak about schools among Romanians?], Lamura 9 (1928), p. 36. 3 GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, p. 149.

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The practice of service in the princely office being passed down from father to son may have begun at an early period. The very first signed Moldavian charter, dated 1401, mentions that it was written by chancellor (logofãt) Bratei. Nineteen years later, Ivaºco, son of Bratei (Ivaºco Brateevici), is recorded as a scribe in the Moldavian office.4 The same father-son relationship can be surmised to have existed between other two named professionals of the written word in the fifteenth-century Moldavian princely office. Chancellor Isaia, who was in the service of the Moldavian princes between 1409 and 1420, mentions in 1414 that he is the son of Gârdu.5 As a scribe Gârdu is attested in the Moldavian office in 1407, it is quite possible that Isaia may have been referring to him.6 To judge from the extant charters, these two scribes and their fathers were the only clerks employed in the Moldavian office until 1422, when the number of scribes and chancellors began to raise, and until the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504) thirty-five other names are mentioned. As the surviving evidence becomes richer, it offers more suggestions about the careers of the early Moldavian literates and the practices of the Moldavian state chancery. It seems that during the fifteenth century skills were learnt in the office, and that chancellors were chosen from former scribes; every fifteenth-century Moldavian chancellor is attested as a former scribe. The status of Moldavian chancellors and of scribes seems to have been high. They are addressed respectfully in the charters as “faithful boyars” or “prince’s boyars”.7 They often receive written confirmation of their landed estates. An example is Toader, brother of priest Luca, who was active in the Moldavian chancery at the end of the fifteenth century as a scribe and was the beneficiary of princely charters recording his landed estates.8 One of the earliest illustrative examples of what the status of a literate might imply in this period is that of Mikhu / Mikhail, scribe and chancellor in the Moldavian office. His family archive, preserved in Poland, provides us with an exceptionally fortunate example for the early period, one in which family relations, political career, landed properties, and whereabouts can be traced in the evidence. The analysis of the course of his life hints at the status needed to begin a career in the prince’s office during the early period; it also suggests the practices followed in the Moldavian state chancery in the fifteenth century. 4

DRH A,

5

DRH A,

6 7 8

1, No. 64 (1419). 1, No. 52. DRH A, 1, No. 29. See, e.g. DRH A, 2, No. 123. DRH A, 3, No. 3, No. 10, No. 24, No. 25 and passim.

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Last but not least it illustrates to what extent service in the prince’s chancery might improve a man’s political and economic standing. Mikhail is attested as a scribe for the first time in 1422, when the Moldavian office still seems to have been run by a limited number of professional clerks. It appears that he began his service in the prince’s office at an early age, as there is a continuous stream of information about him from 1422 until 1470.9 In 1443, after twenty-one years of service, he became chancellor (logofãt).10 The length of his service before this appointment as head of the princely chancery is suggestive of the practices of this institution in Moldavia during the early period. It seems that skills were learnt in the office and that the higher personnel of the chancery were selected from the most experienced scribes in the office. Mikhail was the eldest son of a wealthy senior church hierarch (protopop).11 Between 1424 and 1436 five still extant charters were received by priest Iuga, the father of scribe Mikhail, all confirming his landed estates. Given the fact that only 108 Moldavian charters in total have survived from this period, and even taking into account the circumstance that Iuga / Mikhail family archives were preserved in Poland and had better chances of coming down to us, the number of endowments received by scribe Mikhail’s father points to high social standing and wealth. During his thirty-two years of service in the Moldavian chancery, Mikhail’s wealth increased steadily.12 His landed estates were much more significant than those of his father Iuga, and Mikhail was constantly in the process of acquiring new landed properties through his frequent purchases and the prince’s donations. Fourteen surviving charters testify to his property in land. Over the period in which he served in the Moldavian chancery, Mikhail seems to have become one of the richest and most influential personalities of his time.13 His position in the state chancery gave him a social

9

See, e.g. DRH A, 1, No. 76; DRH A, 2, No. 169. 1, No. 242. 11 In some charters he is recorded as owning ten villages and additional spare land to found new villages (DRH A, 1, No. 56, No. 102, et passim). In 1439 he received a new written confirmation of his landed estates together with his son, Mikhail (DRH A, 1, No. 196); For scribe Mikhail, see also M. COSTÃCHESCU, Documente moldoveneneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, pp. 501505. 12 The last surviving charter attesting him as chancellor dates from Jan. 1454. See DRH A, 2, No. 39. 13 More than fifty villages are recorded in his possession. See, e.g. DRH A, 1, No. 250, No. 254, No. 260, No. 279, and No. 286. 10

DRH A,

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standing that smoothed the way towards a political career.14 We see that Mikhail / Mikhu was also among the first diplomats. In 1456, when the Moldavians first agreed to pay tribute to the Ottoman Empire, he was sent to Istanbul to try to negotiate the amount to be paid or, if that proved impossible, to agree upon the conditions.15 Mikhail is not the only example of this kind. During the reign of Stephen the Great, another chancellor, Tãutu, carved out a similarly brilliant career. A scribe in 146416 and chancellor in 1475,17 his service is the first instance of his family’s providing clerks and chancellors to the Moldavian chancery over the next three centuries.18 His career is one of the longest known; he was chancellor under both Stephen the Great and his son Bogdan, being employed in the Moldavian chancery for forty-seven years. During his long service in the chancery, he became one of the top court officials, the prince’s adviser, and his envoy on various diplomatic missions.19 Scribes also seem to have enjoyed high social standing. By the end of the fifteenth century a pattern of kinship relations between the individuals employed as scribes in the Moldavian chancery becomes apparent. Three brothers, Ion dascãl, Coste, and Toader, were active in the Moldavian chancery at the same time.20 The career of one of the three brothers, Toader, can be recon14 DRH, A, 2, No. 58 (1456). In 1456, he received a letter of safe passage and substantial donations in land and money, in case he was forced to leave Moldavia, from the Polish king, Cazimir, Cf. Colecþia Hurzumachi, 2, No. 111. Mikhail did indeed take refuge in Poland after Stephen the Great (1457-1504) became prince of Moldavia. Stephen sent invitations to him to come back over the next thirteen years. One of Stephen’s invitations was made at the personal request of the Polish king, Cazimir (cf. DRH A, 2, No. 136). 15 DRH A, 2, No. 58 (1456). 16 DRH A, 2, No. 119 (1464). 17 DRH A, 2, No. 201. 18 One of his sons, Toader, is attested as chancellor of the Moldavian princely chancery. See DIR A, vol. 3, No. 436 (1587). Another of his sons, Dragotã Tãutul, signs a charter in 1497. Sons of Dragotã Tãutul were also employed as scribes in the Moldavian chancery during the sixteenth century. In the seventeenth century, other descendants of Tãutul appear in the evidence as scribes. In 1621, e.g. Mihail Tãutu is attested among Vasile Lupu’s scribes. For the Tãutu family, see also GRÃMADÃ “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, pp. 176, 215. 19 For his diplomatic missions, see ª.S. GOROVEI “Activitatea diplomaticã a marelui logofãt Ioan Tãutu”, Suceava: Anuarul Muzeului Judeþean 5 (1978), pp. 237-253; E. TURDEANU, Études des littérature roumaine et d’écrits slaves et grecs des Princpautés Roumaines, p. 136. 20 Ion dascãl is attested first in 1475 (DRH A, 2, No. 199, No. 206); then in 1483 a scribe Coste mentions that he is the brother of Ion dascãl (ibid. No. 249, No. 251, No. 252, 253 and then a scribe Toader mentions that he is the brother of Ion dascãl (ibid., No. 259 (1484)). Cf. also M.M. SZEKELY, Sfetnicii lui Petru Rareº (Iaºi, 2002), pp. 42-44.

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structed. We see him first as Toader, Ion dascãl’s brother,21 then simply as Toader in around 1487, and then as Toader diac (‘scribe’),22 as Toader grãmãtic (‘scribe’),23 and finally as Toader pan, boyar, and chancellor.24 The three brothers received numerous endowments in land, and in the charters which were issued on these ccasions their extensive family is mentioned. During eight years of service in the state chancery, Toader received at least four charters as a scribe and one as chancellor.25 Both in a property charter received by scribe Toader alone and in a charter dealing with the partition of family land, it is mentioned that scribe Toader, his brother, scribe Coste, priest Luca, and other brothers were grandchildren of Pan Negrea, who seems to have been a palatine of Alexandru the Good.26 The landed properties recorded and the status of their grandfather (palatine and pan) testify once again to the high social standing and wealth of the Moldavian scribes of the period. We see a similar pattern to the case of Mikhail: the scion of a high-ranking noble family is employed in the princely chancery and through his service he is able to increase his wealth and status. By the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504), we may notice a more detailed distribution of the occupations in princely chancery. Prior to this, there had been a conflation between the tasks and titles of scribes and chancellors. Both regular scribes and heads of the chancery were called chancellor (logofãt). Their tasks too seem to have overlapped. Logofãt Bratei, for instance, specified in a charter of 1401 that it was written in his own hand.27 By Stephen’s reign, the corroboration of charters points towards a clear distinction within the group of scribes between those who write charters, and the chancellors, who seal them. Chancellors began to occupy a higher position within the group. In the general hierarchy of the Moldavian court officials they ranked second after the grand palatine, and after the early sixteenth century the chancellor even ranked as the highest court official. Later, the positions of second and third chancellor were set up.28 Among the scribes we also see a specialisa21

DRH A,

22

DRH A,

2, No. 259 (1484). 2, No. 51 (1489). 23 DRH A, 2, No. 32 (1488). 24 DRH A, 3, No. 196 (1496) and No. 263 (1502). 25 DRH A, 3, No. 179, No. 192 (1495), No. 263, and passim. 26 DRH A, 3, No. 127; See also SZÉKELY, Sfetnicii lui Petru Rareº, p. 48. 27 DRH A, 1, No. 21; Cf. STOICESCU, Sfatul domnesc ºi marii dregãtori din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, p. 183, note 219. 28 GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, pp. 177-178.

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tion of tasks: a new class of scribes called uricar is recorded.29 They ranked higher than the regular scribes and after the turn of the seventeenth century, when the vernacular began to be used in the Moldavian chancery, they were assigned to write documents in Slavonic. It is noteworthy that, whereas up to this point all Moldavian chancellors were attested as having formerly been scribes, after the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504) the election of chancellors from among former scribes ceased to be a common practice. Presumably the wider diffusion of literacy skills allowed boyars without previous training in the chancery to carry out the duties of the chancellor. After the turn of the sixteenth century, former treasurers could become chancellor. Isac, for instance, who became chancellor in 1513, replacing the famous chancellor Tãutu, had previously been employed as treasurer.30 That many former treasurers (vistiernic) became heads of the chancery may be explained by the circumstance that after the early sixteenth century the chancellor ranked as the highest court official.31 From the early sixteenth century onwards, a previous career within the chancery was no longer required to reach the position of chancellor. The chancery was not longer a closed world, and the office of chancellor (logofãt) began to be bestowed by princes as a mark of status. Another characteristic of the period is that parish priests start to be mentioned among the employees of the princes’ offices.32 Some of them had kinship relations with scribes.33 Grãmadã held that the social pool from which scribes were recruited began to include the families of lower boyars and free peasants.34 Certain high-ranking noble families, however, such as the Tãutus or the family of Dobrul, chancellor under Stephen the Great, continued to provide was still young, as he is identified as belonging to the group of regular group of scribes. 29 Grãmadã believes that this division was influenced by Polish practice; GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, p. 176. 30 DIR A, 1, No. 80; See also the case of Gavriil Totruºan, who replaced chancellor Isac in 1516 (DIR A, 1, No. 101; Similarly, Mateiaº (chancellor from 1541 to 1548) had previously been employed as high treasurer. For details of the career of Mateiaº, see SZÉKELY, Sfetnicii lui Petru Rareº, p. 82. 31 STOICESCU, Sfatul domnesc ºi marii dregãtori din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, p. 173. 32 See, e.g. DIR A, 2, No. 184, No. 208, and No. 210; DIR A, 3, No. 495. Often priests do not record even their Christian names, mentioning only that the deed “was written by a priest”. 33 See, e.g. a very active scribe of the Moldavian chancery in the third decade of the sixteenth century, Cârstea Mihãilescu (DIR A, 3 No. 22, No. 23, No. 27, No. 29, No. 31 (1573), and passim; for his possible son Damian Cârstovici, see DIR A, 3 No. 331 (1585)). 34 GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria domneascã în Moldova”, p. 180.

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174 Z aharia, ~ Nastea former palatine (vornic)

Platon, priest (popã)

Toader, teacher (dascãl)

Isaia

Stanca ~ chamberlain Vartic

Cârstea Mihãilescu, scribe (uricar)

Damian Cârstovici, scribe (diac) Fig. 17 Example of a noble family tree to illustrate kin relations among scribes in sixteenth-century Moldavia.

After the turn of the sixteenth century, we see that the economic position of certain noble families, including that of scribe Mihãilescu, began to decline. The financial means of the family seem to have been fairly modest, as Cârstea Mihãilescu shared with his siblings and cousins a single village, inherited from their grandfather, palatine Zaharia. However, Cârstea Mihãilescu, employee of the prince’s chancery, appears to have been in a better economic position than his kinsmen, as he kept purchasing parts of the jointly held village from his relatives.35 The records of scribes’ resources to purchase land suggest that their services were well remunerated. They continued both to purchase and to receive landed estates from the princes they served.36 Although Moldavian scribes come into view in the evidence more often as sellers than as buyers of their estates, when their land wealth is specified they appear as wealthy landowners. 35

DIR A, 3, No. 44 (1574), No. 76 (1575), and No. 262 (1583); DIR A, 3, No. 161 (1579-82), No. 178 (1580). 36 DIR A, 2, vol. 3, No. 410.

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Service in the prince’s office was an opportunity that brought the employee a higher social position, wealth, and status. As a consequence, certain influential families tended to monopolise their role and tried to secure leading positions in the chancery for their young relatives. Moldavian court officials also remained interested in chancery positions, even when this area of service was no longer as closed and elite-oriented as before. This testifies once more to the economic and political benefits it provided. In addition, during times of political and social instability a position in the chancery provided the necessary financial means to preserve one’s status unaltered, as the case of uricar Cârstea Mihãilescu suggests.

The Wallachian Evidence Data on Wallachian literates employed in the princely writing office are scarce for the fifteenth century. This is due to the small number of charters that have survived from that century and to the circumstance that the names of their scribes are often omitted from early Wallachian princely charters. When they are given, they suggest that here, as in Moldavia, the first scribes were of foreign extraction. The first Slavonic scribes in the Wallachian princely office are thought to have been Bulgarians or Serbs.37 Even later on, during the reign of Mircea the Old, the attestation of scribes is rather exceptional in Wallachia. It is only during the reign of Vlad Dracul (1437-1444) that the names of Wallachian scribes as recorded in charters begin to multiply; even so, for the whole period up to the end of the reign of Vladislav II (1448-1456), only eleven names have come down to us. The total number of attested names of scribes is therefore much smaller than in Moldavia. Among them, many foreign names, such as those of Coica or Laþco, continue to appear in Wallachian charters. This indicates that native and foreign scribes were employed together in the Wallachian office throughout the fifteenth century.38 The confusion between the designations of ‘scribe’ and ‘chancellor’ can be observed in Wallachia too, as both were called logofãt (‘chancellor’) during the early period. Names of chancellors can only be gathered from the witness lists recorded in the corroboratio of charters. Unfortunately, witnesses are not often 37 38

BOGDAN, Diplomatica slavo-romana, p. 53. DRH B, 1, No. 64 (1429-30), No. 86, No. 131 (1468), and passim.

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recorded in the early Wallachian charters, especially when they were written on behalf of monastic institutions. This omission of technical legal details (such as the list of witnesses) illustrates once again that the power of early Wallachian charters was conferred chiefly by religious rather than legal mechanisms.39 Throughout the fifteenth century, the Wallachian evidence concerning early professional literates and their status is rare and patchy. In the few instances in which charters record the names of their scribes or their family relations, they appear, like their Moldavian counterparts, as laymen, and as kinsmen of high court officials. For instance, scribe Ban mentions that he is the son of a Wallachian grand palatine (vornic), the second-highest ranking official in the state.40 Sometimes the charters indicate that the scribes’ positions were coupled with other court offices.41 The data also suggest that during the fifteenth century Wallachian scribes, like those in Moldavia, began their service at an early age and remained in the office for a long time, earning as their reward the high position of second or first chancellor. For example, Coica, who is attested from 1424 as an active Wallachian scribe, shows up in a witness list as one of the first heads of the princely chancery.42 The practices operating in the Wallachian chancery are more consistently clear to us only from the reign of Radu the Great (1495-1508) onwards, when the documentary evidence becomes more plentiful. Seemingly, scribes served in the Wallachian princely chancery for quite a long period of time; often, former scribes made the transition to the post of chancellor. A scribe Oancea, for instance, is attested as scribe from 1491 until 1510,43 when a chancellor Oancea appears in the evidence. We may guess that the former scribe earned a higher position and became the chancellor of the Wallachian princely chancery.44 As chancellor, Oancea is attested in the evidence only up to 8 January 1512, when the Wallachian prince Vlad the Young (1510-1512) was removed by Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521).45 Other examples also illustrate that the careers of Wallachian chancellors may have been shorter than those of their Mol39 40 41 42 43 44 45

See, e.g. DRH B, 2, No. 28, No. 49, and No. 98. 1, No. 248 and No. 281; DRH B, 4, No. 22. DRH B, 1, No. 232 and No. 242; DRH B, 2, No. 49. DRH B, 1, No. 63. DRH B, 1, No. 227. DRH B, 2, No. 78. DRH B, 2, No. 93. DRH B,

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davian counterparts. This was most probably due to the higher degree of political instability in sixteenth-century Wallachia and to the fact that the office of chancellor was ranked the third-highest in the state. These two circumstances may have combined to prevent some influential Wallachian boyars from enjoying a lifetime’s career in the chancery. Unfortunately, little evidence has come down to us from fifteenth-century Wallachia about the wealth of scribes, as charters issued on their behalf are a rare occurrence. Only two charters written for Wallachian chancery scribes are extant from the fifteenth century.46 Even after the turn of the sixteenth century, Wallachian scribes are seldom attested as beneficiaries of charters. However, when their status does find a mention in the evidence it seems to have been high, as they are addressed by princes as jupan (‘boyar’), the highest social rank in Wallachia during this period.47 Moreover, in the few instances when property in land is confirmed as belonging to them, the evidence suggests that scribes possessed considerable landed estates. The loss of their charters notwithstanding, it is also possible that the high price of charters was an obstacle for them as for other Wallachian boyars to record their landed estates, as it appears that scribes would have had to pay the usual fees to the prince. However rare the Wallachian data may be, the scribes appear as wealthy landholders and active purchasers of landed estates. Kinship relations are also attested among the professional literates employed in the Wallachian princely office. One of the earliest examples of such a family group is made up of priest Frâncu, his brother, chancellor Stanciu, and chancellor Stanciu’s son Tudor, scribe and then chancellor.48 Priest Frâncu, like the Moldavian priest Iuga century earlier, was in the prince’s service.49 Later, he is attested among the first Wallachian boyars to have purchases of landed estates recorded in writing.50 Together with his brother, chancellor Stanciu, and his son, Tudor, priest Frâncu seems to have been very record-minded. The family secured their estates in the 46

DRH B, 1, No. 208, No. 244. Cf. STOICESCU, Sfatul domnesc ºi marii dregãtori din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, p. 27. 48 DRH B, 2, No. 115: Chancellor Stanciu commissioned a charter in 1510. He mentions priest Frâncu as his brother (ibid., No. 78). Stanciu himself received at least four princely charters confirming his estates (ibid., No. 146, No. 157, No. 161, and No. 162). Tudor, priest Frâncu’s son and chancellor Stanciu’s nephew, is first attested as scribe in 1504. As early as 1505, a scribe Tudor who describes himself as writer and chancellor is attested (ibid., No. 40). In 1509 a Tudor is witnessing a princely charter identified as chancellor (ibid., No. 65), and he continues to be mentioned until 1510, when he is replaced by Oancea (ibid., No. 81). 49 DRH B, 2, No. 115. 50 DRH B, 2, No. 35 (1505). 47

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prince’s office not once but twice, after a possible preliminary recording in the urban chancery.51 Family relations between employees of the princely chancery are better documented in Wallachia in the second half of the sixteenth century. Chancellors’ sons were employed as clerks and later on as chancellors. Kinship relations among chancery clerks are attested not only between fathers and sons, but also between grandfathers or uncles and their grandchildren and nephews.52 Grandfathers or childless uncles would choose a grandson or nephew and grant him their name, estates, and, one assumes, learning. The favourites thus honoured seem to have been eager to point out this relationship in the charters they wrote. To better understand the workings of the Wallachian chancery in the second half of the sixteenth century, we can take a look at the careers carved out by the members of the Coresi family, which provided three generations of clerks to the prince’s office during that century. Scribe Coresi, son of chancellor Coresi, in his turn seems to have had a son or nephew employed as a scribe in the prince’s office.53 Coresi began his career as a scribe in 1538,54 but only in 1575 a Coresi is mentioned as second chancellor.55 If we are talking about the same Coresi, we perceive a time interval which shows that, with the large number of employees in the prince’s office in this later period, it took longer to attain a higher position. His income seems to have been significant, as he was an active purchaser of land during a period of social crisis in which small landed estates were becoming concentrated into large ones owned by high boyars. In the many charters he secured, his family appear as wealthy landowners.56 His father was also employed as chancellor, and both of them increased their wealth through their income from the princely chancery as well as through notarial services offered to their fellow landowners outside the princely office; they are even mentioned as writers of forged charters.57 51

DRH B, 2, No. 35 and No. 42. See, e.g. DRH B, 11, No. 27 (1595); DRH B, 6, No. 10. 53 A scribe who called himself “Little Coresi” signed a charter in 1572, when Coresi was already the second chancellor, and it is highly improbable that he would have signed in this way if he held that position. Rather, we may presume that “Little Coresi” was the son or nephew of Chancellor Coresi. 54 DRH B, 4, No. 54; DRH B, 6, No. 100 (1568). 55 DRH B, 7, No. 232. 56 DRH B, 6, No. 43 (1567). According to the extant record, Coresi received his first charter only after 29 years of service in the prince’s chancellery. 57 DRH B, 7, No. 232 (1575-1576). Unfortunately, it is hard to establish any connections 52

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Although with a certain time lag, the data indicate that some elements of the early Moldavian pattern can be traced also in Wallachia. The clerks employed in the state chancery were the sons and grandsons of high court officials; they often began their service in the office as scribes at an early age and some, after a long period of service, became heads of the Wallachian chancery. However, the periods of service of Wallachian chancellors are often shorter than those of their Moldavian counterparts. Despite this, we see that certain families in Wallachia, as was also the case in Moldavia, tended to monopolise these positions and pass on their functions in the chancery from generation to generation.

Foreign Scribes Active in the Moldavian and Wallachian State Chanceries The letters, issued in a variety of languages, suggest that the Moldavian principality, and to a lesser extent the Wallachian one, had the ability to observe regional language conventions. Many Moldavian and Wallachian missives sent abroad were issued in Latin and German, or, after the first quarter of the sixteenth century, in Polish, Hungarian, or Romanian. Unfortunately, little information is available about their writers. Only occasionally are their names mentioned.58 Any additional information is limited to their places of origin and ethnic background. The particularities of these written documents, taken together with the names of their writers, suggest that the majority of scribes may have been of foreign origin and had come to Wallachia and Moldavia either from Transylvania or from Poland.59 Ciurea argues, however, that native Moldavian scribes were also able to write documents in Latin or Polish.60 between the family of Coresi, active in the Wallachian chancellery, and printer Coresi, who published one of the first known Romanian and Slavonic liturgical books. The latter was active in Transylvania (Sibiu / Hermannstadt) in the second half of the sixteenth century (1560-1581). For more information about Coresi the printer, see D. SIMONESCU, “Un mare editor ºi tipograf din secolul al XVI-lea: Coresi” [A great editor and printer of the sixteenth century: Coresi], Studii ºi cercetãri de bibliologie 11 (1969), pp. 53-61, at p. 56. 58 Cf. CIUREA “Diplomatica latinã în ãrile Române: Noi contribuþii”, p. 9. 59 For more information about Polish documents and their scribes, see LINÞA “Documente în limba polonã emise de cancelariile domnilor români (sec. al XVI-lea ºi al XVII-lea)”, pp. 171, 180; See also GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria Moldovei”, pp. 26-27. 60 D. CIUREA, “Diplomatica latinã în Þarile Române: Noi contribuþii”, p. 11; LINÞA “Docu-

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According to the extant evidence, especially during the fifteenth century the position of Latin-language scribes seems occasional at best in Moldavia; only from the reign of Stephen the Great onwards can we trace continuity in the employment of such scribes.61 For Wallachia, we have slightly richer information about foreign scribes once the sixteenth century begins. One Wallachian princely letter indicates that there may have been a practice of requesting scribes for the Latin-language documents from Transylvania. The Wallachian prince Radu Paisie (1534-1545) asked the town officials of Sibiu for “a well trained and learned scribe since the previous one has fallen ill and I do not have any other left”.62 The letter does not mention whether this Wallachian prince needed a scribe for Latin or for Slavonic documents, but it is well known that during his reign many scribes active in the Wallachian chancery were capable of writing documents in Slavonic. We may therefore assume that the scribe being requested was meant to work on Latin documents. Toward the mid-sixteenth century, when the surviving evidence becomes slightly richer in Moldavia, it is clear that most often the services of a single scribe at a time were sufficient to draft documents in Latin or German in the chancery of the Moldavian princes. These scribes seem to be of foreign origin, considering to their names, and often they remained in the service of a prince for the entire duration of his reign. Besides their services in the chanceries, foreign scribes often carried out diplomatic missions. The secretary of the Moldavian Prince Rareº, Johannes Literatus seems to have been in the prince’s service for at least three years. He is one of the first to be attested as carrying out a variety of political63 and economic64 missions for this prince. Later on, Georgius de Revelles stayed in Lãpuºneanu’s service from 1559 to 1562 as the regular writer of letters in German.65 When Lãpuºneanu was overthrown, De Revelles remained in the service of Despot (1561-1563), his enemy and successor, for whom he wrote German66 and Latin letters.67 After Lãpuºneanu succeeded in regaining the throne of Moldavia, De mente în limba polonã”, pp. 174-175. 61 GRÃMADÃ, “Cancelaria Moldovei”, p. 75. 62 P.P. PANAITESCU, “Documente slavo-române din Sibiu (1470-1653)”, No. 47. 63 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 677 (8 April 1531). 64 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 552 (14 Febr. 1528). 65 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1003 (5 June 1559), No. 1040 (31 Oct. 1560), No. 1046 (1 Jan., 1561), No. 1047 (13 Jan 1561), and passim. 66 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1064 (17 March 1562). 67 Documente privitoare la istoria Românilor, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 2.1 (Bucharest, 1900), No. 378 (27 March 1562).

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Revelles seems to have been replaced by Stephanus a Dees, who remained in the service of the Moldavian princes from 1564 to 1570 and appears to have produced almost all surviving Latin letters issued during this period.68 He remained in the Moldavian chancery until the end of Lãpuºneanu’s reign and afterwards was employed by his son and successor, Bogdan. Unfortunately, after Bogdan Lãpuºneanu’s reign the number of surviving letters diminishes, and the information at our disposal is becoming thinner. One scribe who is attested as scribe in the service of Moldavian princes (from the reign of Ion Vodã (1572-1574) until that of Simeon and Constantin Movilã) does not even record his Christian name.69 The status and position of foreign scribes seems to have been high, similar to that of the local scribes. The above-mentioned Wallachian prince Radu Paisie promises in his letter to treat the scribe with honour and pay him accordingly.70 For Moldavia there are also snippets of information suggesting that foreign scribes held a privileged position. Letters commissioned in his own name by Georgius de Revelles, the foreign scribe of Alexandru Lãpuºneanu, suggest the high degree of princely trust he enjoyed.71 However, it seems that there were times when scribes abused this trust. We find Petru Rareº urging the authorities of the town of Bistriþa to arrest his secretary and enemy Johannes Literatus, whom he had sent on a political mission three years earlier.72 In general, though, it seems that foreign scribes active in the Moldavian and Wallachian chanceries enjoyed a stable and privileged position.

Scribes Employed in the Urban or Regional Offices The layout of surviving early Moldavian letters issued from Baia and Suceava suggests that during the fifteenth century professional scribes may have been active in the Moldavian urban offices, even if the external features of the surviving letters suggest that their services were rather occasional during that century. 68 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1102 (c. 1564-8), No. 1103 (1564), No. 1159 (1 June 1567), (15 March 1568), and passim. 69 LINÞA, “Documente în limba polonã”, p. 177. 70 PANAITESCU, “Documente slavo-române din Sibiu (1470-1653)”, No. 47. 71 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1002 (6May 1559). 72 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 695 (15 May 1535) and No 723 (15 Dec. 1538); cf. also CIUREA, “Diplomatica latinã în Þãrile Române: Noi contribuþii”, p. 9.

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In the second half of the sixteenth century, town and regional offices began to issue land charters. The layout of Wallachian urban charters is different from that of the contemporary charters issued in the prince’s chancery.73 The full invocation that is a feature of urban charters suggests that urban scribes may have been trained in the monasteries. The names of some scribes also suggest that they may have belonged to a religious order. By contrast, early Wallachian scribes at the regional level seem to have been directly dependent on the practices of the state chancery, as certain clerks who provided writing services for Craioveºti boyars during the early sixteenth century are attested among the princely chancery’s scribes.74 Even in Wallachia, where more title deeds issued outside the princely office are extant, most charters bear no information about their scribes. If names are recorded, most appear only once, which suggests either that charters issued at the urban or regional level had a lower chance of survival or that scribal activity there was inconsistent and probably occasional. One exception is the urban office of Bucharest, which permits some tentative conclusions about the scribes employed in the urban offices, even if the evidence mainly concerns the last quarter of the sixteenth century. Both the number of surviving charters and the attestation of several scribes at a time are indications of busy and continuous scribal activity in the urban office of the capital of Wallachia in the last decades of the sixteenth century. The information we have about the scribes suggests that the pattern that was characteristic of the Wallachian state chancery was translated locally. Family relations can be traced between scribes and priests, and between different scribes.75 Different from the princely chancery, however, their Christian names suggest that at least some urban scribes were members of a monastic order. For example, one of the active scribes of the Bucharest urban office was called Eftimie, presumably the name of a monk. In a contemporary Greek note, he is mentioned as being the son of priest Grozav.76 The scribes of urban charters, like chancery scribes, seem to have stayed in office for a long period.77 Eftimie worked in the Bucharest urban chancery 73

See, e.g. DRH B, No. 5 and No. 266 (13 May 1563). The first two written donations made by Craioveºti boyars were written by scribe Stepan (DRH B, 2, No. 47); A scribe Stepan is active in the Wallachian chancery during the same period (ibid., No. 72, No. 81). 75 DRH B, 2, No. 157 (1517). 76 DRH B, 5, No. 266 (1563). 77 Eftimie is attested between 1563 and 1571 (DRH B, 5, No. 266; DRH B, 7, No. 26). 74

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from 1563 to 1571.78 Another scribe, Dimitrie, is attested from 1577 until 1580,79 while early in 1580 Dimitrie the Old begins to be recorded.80 He continued his service in the Bucharest chancery until at least February1590.81 Besides these two scribes, eight other names of scribes of charters were recorded in the urban office in the last two decades of the sixteenth century, one of whom identified himself as a priest and three as chancellors.82 Possibly at the urban level there was the same confusion between scribes and chancellors as there had been earlier on in the princely office. The quite numerous staff indicates that writing activities were continuous at the urban level, at least in certain areas.

Writers of Land Records at the Village Level The scribes who did the writing at the village level appear to have been a diverse group. Most of them are obscure; even their Christian names are seldom mentioned. Others seem to be professionals of the written word, with some being active in the princely chancery as well, especially in Moldavia. Almost half of several dozen surviving Moldavian deeds seem to have been written by professional scribes.83 For instance, Ionaºco, the scribe from Galbeni, as he signs his name in princely charters, is attested as the scribe of a deed that was apparently recorded in writing in his village or place of residence, in the house of priest Luciu from Galbeni.84 Likewise in Wallachia, the scribes of deeds, men such as Ivaºco from Loviºte85 and Stãnilã,86 were active scribes of the state chancery during the same period. 78

P. ZAHARIUC, “Nouã documente din secolul al XVI-lea privitoare la istoria oraºului Bucureºti” [Nine sixteenth-century documents related to the history of Bucharest], in: Civilizaþia urbanã din spaþiul românesc în secolele XVI-XVIII: Studii ºi documente, ed. L. RÃDVAN (Iaºi, 2006), pp. 205-221, No. 1 (1 March 1565) and No. 2 (24 May 1565). 79 DRH B, 8, No. 73 (26 May 1577), No. 109 (9 Jan., 1578), No. 136 (5 July 1578), and No. 329 (2 Nov., 1580). 80 “Nouã documente din secolul al XVI-lea privitoare la istoria oraºului Bucureºti”, No. 4 (1580, Jan.13) and No. 5 (1580, March 16). 81 DIR B, 5, No. 448 (16 Febr. 1590). 82 See, e.g. “Nouã documente din secolul al XVI-lea privitoare la istoria oraºului Bucureºti”, No. 6 (1585); DIR B, 5, No. 307 (1587). 83 DIR A, 3, No. 306 (1584); DIR A, 4, No. 8, No. 38. 84 DIR A, 3, No. 306. 85 See, e.g. DRH B, 8, No. 32, No. 94. 86 DIR B, 5, No. 316; DRH B, 8, No. 19, No. 20, No. 218, No. 221, and No. 286.

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Writing at the village level was also done by parish priests87 and monks.88 Parish priests appear among the most common writers of deeds. Sporadically, young relatives of court officials acted as scribes of charters.89 We find them recording their personal transactions, along with those of their clientele90 and of their fellow boyars.91 By the end of the sixteenth century, even some small Moldavian landowners seem able to record their own or their family’s land transactions.92 Only on occasion have I been able to trace a period of continuous activity by a particular village priest as a scribe of local land transactions. That was the Moldavian priest Andonie from Childeºti, who recorded land transactions for governor Bantaº from 1586 until 1596.93 Priest Andonie seems to have enjoyed the status of village notary, as he always does the writing, even when other professionals of the written word and priests are mentioned among the witnesses of the same charter.94 Moreover, he travelled from his village of Childeºti to another village, Drãguºeni, to record a land conveyance, despite the fact that a local priest, Lupu, is mentioned among the witnesses of the land conveyance.95 A comparable situation is recorded from Wallachia. Priest Pãtru from ªura (Pãtru ot ªura) is one of the few regular scribes of Wallachian deeds. He travelled to another village, Balboºi, to record a transaction at the house of another priest, Stoia from Balboºi (Stoia ot Balboºi).96 It would seem that literates were not available in every village, and that village priests were not always able to write.97 The narratives of the eighteenth century also allude to a general lack of writing skills among parish priests. Neculce describes the great distress of old parish priests at the decision taken in 1714 by the prince Constantin Mavrocordat to limit a new tax exemption to literate priests.98 87 88 89 90 91 92 93

DRH B,

11, No. 75 (1594). 3, No. 471 (1588). DRH B, 8, No. 157 (1577). DIR A, 4, No. 298 and No. 244. DIR A, 4, No. 43 (c. 1591-2) and No. 298 (1599). Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 104. Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 66, No. 68, No. 83, and No. DIR A,

105. 94 95 96 97 98

See Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 83. Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 105. Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti din secolul al XVI-lea, No. 5. DIR A, 3, No. 459. Letopiseþul Þãrii Moldovei, p. 157.

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The Cost of Having Charters Written Up to the end of the sixteenth century, neither in Moldavia nor in Wallachia information about the official fee to be paid for the drafting of documents can be found. The only indication we have of the possible cost of a charter is a good horse given by the beneficiaries of charter(s) as a gift to the prince in Wallachia.99 That even in countries with a more mature tradition of writing, such as Poland and Hungary, official fees were fixed only at the turn of the sixteenth century,100 strongly suggests that in Moldavia and Wallachia they were not established during the period. We can speak of a fixed income of chancery employees only after the administrative reforms of the Phanariot princes during the eighteenth century.101 A Moldavian narrative source confirms that official fees were established as late as the second reign of Constantin Mavrocordat (1741-1743).102 In Wallachia, the first fees of work done by court officials were also fixed during the eighteenth century, as a result of the administrative reforms of prince Mavrocordat.103 The price to be paid for the redaction of charters begins to be mentioned during the sixteenth century, but only sporadically. The information we have mainly concerns the cost of deeds, the demand for which increased in the second half of that century.104 Rare as it is, the evidence does suggest that the price to be paid for the drafting of charters remained high even in the second half of the sixteenth century, when the production of title deeds moved down from the central state chancery to the urban, regional, and even village levels. For example, chancellor Coresi received a Gypsy slave as payment for writing a charter 99 For the discussion of the practice of ‘horse offering’ (darea calului), see STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã româneascã, p. 130; C. GIURESCU, Studii de istorie socialã [Studies on social history] (Bucharest, 1943), p. 251. 100 In Hungary, the amount of the fee was established in 1492; cf. Corpus Iuris Hungarici, 1, pp. 548-550. In Poland, the exact size of the fees to be paid for the writing of various types of documents was fixed in 1511 (see GRÃMADÃ, Cancelaria Moldovei, p. 155 and note 3; see also A. BARTOSZEWICZ, “The litterati burghers in Polish late medieval towns”, Acta Poloniae Historica 83 (2001), pp. 17, 19). In Serbia, the Law Code of Dushan, written in 1349, already mentions the payment of chancellors and scribes for document writing. See The Code of Serbian Tsar Stephan Dushan: The Bistritza transcript, ed. Ð. KRSTIÆ (Belgrade, 1997), p. 85, No. 129. 101 Studii ºi documente, 23, 18. 102 In his second reign in Moldavia, he established the fee levels. See M. KOGÃLNICEANU, Cronicile Romaniei seu Letopiseþele Moldaviei ºi Valahiei, 2nd edn., 3 vols. (Bucharest, 1874), 3, p. 183. 103 IORGA, Studii ºi documente, 23, p. 21. 104 See, e.g. DRH B, 7, No. 128 (1573); DRH B, 8, No. 5 (1577).

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for the two laymen Radu and Moºul.105 Another example from the same period indicates that a “strip or a belt of land” was purchased for 250 silver coins, and 50 silver coins were paid for the written record.106 In 1581, in Moldavia a certain layman Andreica had to pay 40 zloti (‘gold coins’) for two charters and 14 for a deed,107 while during the same period a part of a village could be purchased for a hundred golden coins. It seems, however, that the price demanded for these charters must have been particularly steep, as a new charter was subsequently issued to request the return of the large fee paid for their writing.108 According to the surviving evidence, up until the middle of the fifteenth century in Moldavia and up to a century later in Wallachia, no other group of Moldavian or Wallachian boyars received as many charters confirming their landed estates as chancellors. We may assume that to chancery clerks, and especially for chancellors, written records were more accessible. An interesting case is that of Harvat, the head of the Wallachian chancery under Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521), who received eight (extant) charters confirming his previously owned landed estates and his new purchases. All of these were issued during his service in the prince’s chancery, at an average of almost one charter per year, while no charter is attested from a previous period of six years when he held other court offices, such as those of treasurer and constable.109 This is one of the highest numbers of charters extant received by a Wallachian individual in the period,110 and a significant number in itself, as from the reign of Neagoe Basarab only fifty-five charters written on behalf of lay landowners survive. As Harvat’s charters did not enjoy special storage conditions, this suggests that the costs of written records were significant even for the highest court officials. It is possible that employees of the prince’s chancery, and in particular the chancellors themselves, were exempt from the payment of certain fees, as two out of six original charters issued for Harvat mention that the prince “had forgiven the payment of the horse” which presumably constituted part of the fee.111 We may conclude that employees of the princely chancery 105 DIR B, 4, No. 187. The price of a Gypsy slave during the period could range between five hundred and a thousand silver coins. See, e.g. DIR B, 4, No. 215 (1576). 106 DRH B, 8, No. 97 (1577). 107 DIR A, 3, No. 353. See also DIR A, 2, No. 77. 108 DIR A, 3, No. 337. 109 He is attested as grand constable from 1508 to 1509 and grand treasurer between 1510 and 1514. See STOICESCU, Dicionar al marilor dregãtori din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, p. 63. 110 DRH B, 2, No. 121, No. 144, No. 167, No. 171, No. 172, No. 179, No. 204, and No. 206. 111 Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 46.

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enjoyed not only the financial means to enlarge their landed estates but also a preferential status when it came to securing the confirmation of these estates in written form.

Chancery Scribes as Proto-Diplomats Chancery scribes are often attested as emissaries abroad. This may suggest that this was one of their regular duties.112 In the frequent Moldavian and Wallachian diplomatic missions sent to Poland, Lithuania, Hungary, and the Transylvanian urban administrations, foreign and native scribes as well as chancellors are recorded as messengers of the Moldavian and Wallachian princes, carriers of oral information, or, later, of letters.113 For example, Iohannes Salanchy, “secretarium nostrum”, fulfilled many missions to Sibiu under Petru Rareº in 1525, as the surviving credentials that he presumably carried with him demonstrate.114 In Wallachia, chancellor Tatul is repeatedly attested as envoy to the Braºov authorities and to the king of Hungary.115 In some cases, the scribes sent to Braºov as envoys by Moldavian or Wallachian princes are recorded as producers of charters during the their diplomatic missions. There are many examples of scribes mentioned as envoys. For instance, scribe Oprea, active in the Wallachian chancery, carried Basarab the Young’s letters to the Braºov administration and to the prince of Transylvania.116 In Moldavia, scribe and chancellor Vulpaº, active in the state chancery during the reign of Stephen the Great, is attested as Stephen’s envoy to Braºov.117 Sometimes the identity of the messengers is uncertain, as in most 112

Szekely thought that diplomatic functions might have been their main task; see SZEKELY, Sfetnicii, p. 447. 113 In the complex of foreign relations established by Stephen the Great at the end of the fifteenth century, scribes carried out many diplomatic missions to Poland, Lithuania, and Moscow. To give just a few examples. Scribe Matiaº was sent, together with Governor Giurgea, to the Polish King Alexander. (cf. COSTÃCHESCU, Documente ªtefan, 2, No. 173). In 1498, scribe ªandru was sent to the high knez of Moscow, and one year later, in 1499, scribe Costea is listed among Moldavian ambassadors to the Polish King (ibid., No. 141 and No. 180). 114 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 520 (20 Dec. 1525). 115 534 documente istorice slavo-române din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, No. 332, No. 337, and No. 338. 116 Documente ºi regeste privitoare la Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 115 (c. 1478-1479). 117 Documente ºi regeste privitoare la relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 87 (1474).

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cases only the Christian names of these proto-diplomats are given.118 It appears that both native and foreign scribes, and certainly chancellors, combined service in the chancery with diplomatic missions. They continued to do so in the later period, remaining among the most active participants in diplomatic missions up to the end of the sixteenth century and beyond.

The Education of the First Literates There is neither direct nor indirect evidence about the training of chancery staff. Iorga and Bogdan argue that early literate professionals were trained in the monasteries. Direct evidence about schooling in the monasteries is attested only from the seventeenth century, however; for earlier periods only unsubstantiated information is available. It seems nevertheless reasonable to assume that later scribal practices may have grown out of an older tradition. However, both the differences between the layout of princely and monastic charters and the recurrent instances of kinship relations between early professional literates suggest rather that basic literacy may have been taught in the family. It would seem that the mastery of the Slavonic language by the early native scribes was poor. For them, scribal activities were rather the craft of writing in the sense of putting words on parchment or paper. Their usage of certain preexisting formulas in the text, sometimes even arbitrarily, testifies to a partial knowledge of Slavonic only on their part, and to a lack of proper training.119 The Moldavian chancellor Luca Stroici / Stroicz, who served as chancellor under six princes,120 marks the transition between the earlier period, with its restricted written culture, and the seventeenth century, which may be considered a period of cultural renaissance in Moldavia and Wallachia. Some scholars believe that he was one of the first Moldavian laymen to own a private library. In Romanian historiography he is also considered to have been one of the earliest Moldavian boyars with scholarly interests, and to be the possible author of a chronicle of Moldavia.121 What is clear from the evidence, however, 118

See, e.g. “Georgius litteratus”, Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 796. Cf. STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã, p. 44. 120 He is attested as treasurer and then as chancellor from 1580 to 1591, and again from 1595 to 1610. 121 In the Romanian historiography it is believed that the request of the Polish chancellor Jan Zamoyski for a “kronike woloska” (addressed in 1597 to an unnamed Moldavian chancellor, during the period of Stroici’s chancellorship) suggests that Stroici was the author of the men119

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is only that chancellor Stoici was among the first Moldavians to have had a different perception of the writing of letters. His correspondence suggests that the business of writing was not restricted to official business but could extend also to private and even leisure interests. Only from the middle of the seventeenth century onwards do we get more evidence about chancellors and scribes as authors of literary works and owners of libraries.122 ***

The professional scribes of the Moldavian and Wallachian princely chanceries were boyars of high social standing, usually sons of high court officials. Monastic names only occasionally show up in the Wallachian evidence; sons of high ecclesiastics are more often documented among the early scribes. Reading and writing would seem to have been taught in the family, as is suggested by the recurrence of these skills among certain families who held chancery positions across the generations, in an almost dynastic tradition. Careers in the chancery seem to have been lengthy; scribes began their service at an early age and their professional skills appear to have been learnt in the office. These characteristics mark out the chancery of the fifteenth century as a somewhat autonomous, isolated environment. Only former scribes were skilled enough to qualify for the position of chancellor. After the turn of the sixteenth century, especially in Moldavia, the social pool from which scribes were recruited becomes wider. The position of chancellor began to be ranked as the highest court office and was no longer the preserve of former scribes but was bestowed by princes in recognition of special merit. This opening up of the chancellorship is an indication of the wider dissemination of writing in sixteenth-century Moldavia as compared to Wallachia. tioned chronicle. See G. FRANCK, “Un mare ctitor-boier Luca Stroici”, p. 306. See also B. PETRIHAªDEU, “Luca Stroici, Pãrintele filologiei latino-române” in: Studii de lingvisticã ºi filologie, ed. G. BRÂNCUªI (Bucharest, 1988), p. 70. 122 ª. GOROVEI, “Nicolae (Milescu) Spãtarul: Contribuþii biografice”, Anuarul Institutului de Istorie ºi Arheologie ‘A.D. Xenopol’ 21 (1984), pp. 179-182; ID., “Un cãrturar uitat: Logofãtul Grigoraº”, Anuarul Institutului de Istorie ºi Arheologie ‘A.D. Xenopol’ 23. 2 (1986), pp. 681-698; See also N. DJUVARA, Între Orient ºi Occident: Þãrile Române la începutul epocii moderne (1800-1848) [Between East and West: The Danubian Principalities at the beginning of the modern era], 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 2002), p. 92. CEICU

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Service in the prince’s chancery led to opportunities for a political career and to increased wealth. Written culture was restricted, and professionals of the written word were perceived as possessing a distinguishing and highly specialised skill. The ability to write certainly brought them the appreciation of their fellows, a rise in social status and, last but not least, financial benefits.123 Hence the upper nobility and ecclesiastical leaders tried to secure positions in the chancery for their younger relatives. The social standing associated with the practice of writing is shown not only by the individual careers it made possible, but also by the long-term development of family policies. Moldavian and Wallachian court officials remained interested in chancery service, even when the office ceased to be so closed and elite-oriented as it had been before the sixteenth century. As written culture spread further, the local gentry also became interested to record their land conveyances in writing. The increased need for written records, along with the use of the vernacular as a language of record, opened up the role of notaries to parish priests, especially at the village level.

123

p. 66.

Cf. J. OXENHAM, Literacy: Writing, Reading and Social Organisation (London, 1980),

Part II: Use and Dissemination of Pragmatic Documents

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Records and their Uses he evidence suggests that Wallachian and Moldavian subjects started to use writing as a method of recording land only after the foundation of the states. In Moldavia, this began at the end of the fourteenth century. Court officials recorded not only their newly acquired land but also estates that seem to have already been in their possession for long periods. In Wallachia, information referring to laymen commissioning land charters starts to make an appearance after the mid-fifteenth century; the few extant earlier charters had been commissioned mostly by monastic institutions. We may therefore suppose that Moldavian boyars started using charters earlier and more frequently than their Wallachian colleagues. What might the reasons for this difference have been? The answer may have something to do with the fact that Moldavia was founded by foreign settlers, who seem to have come from the Maramureº region of Transylvania, which formed part of the kingdom of Hungary.1 Possibly the newcomers, in need of safeguarding their newly acquired landed properties, turned to the use of written records, which were already commonly used in the Hungarian kingdom.2 The low number of charters commissioned on behalf of Wallachian laymen suggests no major changes in land ownership; local lords continued to control their traditional estates, ownership being confirmed by

T

1 H.H. STAHL, Contribuþii la studiul satelor devãlmaºe româneºti [Contributions to the study of Romanian joint-tenancy villages], 2nd edn., 3 vols. (Bucharest, 1998), 3, p.179; see also his shortened English version: ID., The Traditional Romanian Joint-Tenancy Villages (Cambridge, 1986). 2 M. Rady indicates that there are well over 300.000 surviving individual legal and administrative documents relating to the Hungarian Middle Ages. See M. RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary (London, 2000), p. 9.

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customary law and oral memory rather than by written records. Holding their landed properties within large kindred groups, Wallachian land owners did not yet feel a need for written instruments.3 The procedure of commissioning early charters shows that in the fifteenth century the use of written documents as title deeds proving land ownership was a novelty for Wallachian landowners. In the early surviving charters no previous written records are mentioned. Rights to property were typically asserted by oral testimony, pledged by the owner of the land and his oath helpers. In 1494, for instance, a large patriarchal family, identified by their Christian names, came before the Wallachian prince to request a title deed for a part of a village which they had inherited from an ancestor. In the process, the landowners, along with their oath helpers, had to take an oath to confirm that the estate had previously been in their family’s possession.4 Apparently, landowners were allowed to take this oath also locally, before the palatine (vornic), who in his turn had to testify before the prince that he had witnessed the testimony: By God’s grace, Io Vlad, prince and master of the entire land of Ungrovlachia, son of great prince Vlad. Our highness gives this mandate to our highness’s servants Radu, with his grandsons and sons, and Dragul, with his grandsons and sons, and Roºca, with his grandsons and sons (...) [missing part] and Radu, with his brothers and grandsons and their sons, and Draghislav, with his grandsons and their sons, and Drãgan, with his grandsons and their sons, to hold a domain at Petreu, half of the third part [of the village], because this is their rightful and old estate. And after this, boyar (jupan) Cârstian, palatine, testified before our highness that twelve boyars had taken the oath before him. He stated under oath that those above-written men had held their estate at Petreu, half of the third part, from their ancestors. So our highness let them hold half of the third part as they did it up to now, and as jupan Cârstian avowed. And because of this, our highness granted them to hold their land as their own rightful property, for them, and for their sons, and for their grandsons. May this land never revert to the prince because of a lack of male heirs (prãdalicã sã nu fie); and nobody shall touch it, according to our utterances. Mihail wrote [this] in the capital (cetatea de scaun) Târgoviºte, 15 days of the month of July, in the year 7002 .5

3

For a similar phenomenon in neighbouring Hungary, see RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 64. 4 See, e.g. DRH B, 1 No. 249 (1494). 5 DRH B, 1, No. 250 (1494).

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In Moldavia, an increase in the number of surviving charters may be observed from the reigns of the sons and successors of Alexandru the Old (c. 1430-1440) onwards, while in Wallachia such an increase is seen only in the last decades of the fifteenth century, in particular from the reign of Vlad the Monk (1482-1495) onwards. Another significant difference between the two states is that in Moldavia early charters were commissioned for regular land endowments, whereas in Wallachia they can for the most part be found documenting exceptional situations, such cases of boyars striving to avoid customary restrictions with regard to land succession and transactions. Apart from land-related issues, there is some evidence to suggest that written records were also used by Wallachian and Moldavian subjects in other matters. Exceptionally, documents have survived which were issued to record a change in legal status, or an exemption from military service.6 These written endorsements appear to have been issued on behalf of a persons from a wide range of social groups, however lowly their status. One piece of evidence is particularly noteworthy. In 1470, the Moldavian prince Stephen the Great (1457-1504) commissioned a charter on behalf of a Tartar slave to grant “him and his children freedom for ever”.7 This shows that even slaves became gradually aware of the power of written records.

The Wallachian Context: Women’s (Lack of) Rights to Inherit Land and the Transition from Oral to Written Forms of Land Possession The first increase in the number of extant Wallachian charters seems to be related to the bar on Wallachian women inheriting family land. The evidence testifies that estates without a male heir (defectus seminis; ‘default of male heirs’) were declared prãdãlicã8 and were confiscated by the prince.9 In 1482, 6

DIR A,

7

DRH A,

3, No. 328 (1565). 2, No. 162 (1470). 8 Stahl defines prãdalicã as the rights of the prince to take over estates left without heirs. See STAHL, Contribuþii la studiul satelor devãlma e româneºti, 3, pp. 182-204. 9 The right of Wallachian women to inherit family land is a controversial issue in the Romanian historiography. Stahl argued that Wallachian women were not entitled to inherit land property. Cf. STAHL, Contribuþii la studiul satelor, 2, p. 116. Conversely, Codarcea claimed that a mixture of Slavonic and Roman law led to a specific Wallachian land inheritance practice in which there was equality between the first generation of male and female siblings. Cf. C. CODARCEA, Société et pouvoir en Vallachie (1601-1654) entre la coutume et la loi (Bucharest, 2002), p. 191.

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for instance, twelve boyars came before the prince and declared a property to be without heirs (prãdãlicã).10 By the mid-fifteenth century, the power of Wallachian boyars with regard to the central power seems to have grown stronger; they started challenging the right of the prince to appropriate the estates of boyars without male heirs. Practices such as ‘prefection’ (praefectio in filium) or ‘fraternal adoption’ were used to promote daughters of boyars without male offspring to the status of ‘sons’ or ‘brothers’, and as a result they became rightful inheritors of family land. Most probably, these practices reached the Wallachian principality via Hungary.11 Many early Wallachian charters were commissioned to record these legal fictions: (...) And after this, Cârstian came before our highness and he put (a aºezat) his daughters Mica and Stana on his landed estate so that they are like his sons. And after this Cârstea and his brother Cârstian came again before our highness and made an agreement, so that the sons of Cârstea and the daughters of Cârstian, who are written above, became for ever joined brothers on all these above-written landed estates. And they gave a good horse to our highness (...).12

This type of charter becomes common from the reign of Vlad Dracul (1437-1441).13 Among the first to challenge the princely rights of defectus seminis were the most influential boyars, usually court officials. By the end of the fifteenth century, we see a consistent increase in number of charters commissioned for this purpose. For instance, from the reign of Radu the Great (1495-1508) almost half of the surviving title deeds issued for boyars record either of these two practices. The fifteenth-century evidence suggests mainly the highest boyars and their immediate relatives were able to commission a princely charter to avoid defectus seminis.14 One of the first known officials to 10 It seems that this type of land appropriation was thorny, as the prince had not kept the land but instead donated it to his palatinus, who in his turn donated it to his servants. See DRH B, 1, No. 181. 11 We see a similar phenomenon in earlier Hungary. See Stephen Werbõczy, The Tripartitum, I, 89. See also E. FÜGEDI, The Elefánthy: The Hungarian Boyar and His Kindred, trans. D. KARBIC (Budapest, 1998), p. 27; RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p.107. 12 DRH B, 1, No. 296 (1500). 13 DRH B, 1, No. 84. 14 Commissioners of these charters are often referred to as jupan. See, e.g. DRH B, 1, No. 296

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Fig. 18 Deed comissioned by Fãtul the Old to turn one of his daughters, Stana, into a son. Written by scribe Ivan (Ivan gramatic), using a monastic template; no seals or fingerprints used. 11 March 1573 (7081). Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I. , no. 930. Photo: Mariana Goina.

have transformed the status of his daughter for legal purposes is Stroe, the brother-in-law of a Wallachian chancellor.15 Stroe used both juridical fictions: for legal purposes he turned his daughter into a son and, at the same time, the new ‘son’ was declared a ‘brother’ of the chancellor. As the charter states: I, our highness, with all my good will, I have given my fair and rightful charter which stands above all true gifts, to jupan Tudor logofãt (‘chancellor’) and jupan Stroe, his brother-in-law, and to his daughter Stana, since jupan Stroe proclaimed his daughter Stana to be as his son before our highness; [he mandated] jupan Tudor chancellor to be Stroe’s daughter’s brother on the estates of the Orboeºti and Brãteºti villages, on all parts that belong to Stroe. And they had given a horse to our highness, but I forgave that payment.16

(1500) and No. 244 (1493). 15 Stroe is not attested as the acting chancellor of the period. He may have been also a scribe, as during the early period there both chancellors and scribes were called ‘chancellors’ in the Wallachian evidence. 16 DRH B, 1, No. 175 (1480).

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The chancellor, in the event of Stroe’s daughter’s death, would become Stroe’s heir (note that the chancellor is listed in the first place as the beneficiary of the charter, while Stroe and his daughter Stana come after him, in the economical wording of these charters). It could be that this was the price Stroe paid for legalising his daughter as the potential inheritor of the land, as the charter specifies that the prince had forgiven payment in the form of a horse. As we have noted before, apparently employees of the princely chancery must have had special facilities for commissioning written records, for they were pioneers in registering their extraordinary practices of land succession, just as previously they had been among the first commissioners of charters for their own estates.17 The use of written records to avoid customary restrictions with regard to female land inheritance was not restricted to the upper nobility. After the turn of the century, especially from the reign of Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521) onwards, these practices are also mentioned in documents secured by the lesser nobility. In charters commissioned by extended families, daughters are turned into potential land inheritors by means of these two practices. In some charters up to ten such cases are recorded.18 The evidence suggests that the two practices could also be secured by oral agreements: the formulas recording the practices describe them either as being accomplished “before the prince”, which presumably involved a written record, or as taking place “before good people”, which suggests an oral agreement. However, we also have many charters recording these contracts. As these new forms of land inheritance came into being outside of the norms of customary law, “not by inheritance or bloodright but by the force of royal favour”, their backing in charters issued by the princely chancery was apparently perceived as extra support.19 Consequently, I argue that this fight for land and power between princes and boyars led to the first increase in the use of written land records in Wallachia. After the turn of the sixteenth century, another shift in the rights of Wallachian women to inherit family land can be traced in the evidence: the fifteenth-century practice of prefection ceases to show in the surviving sixteenth-century records. Fraternal adoptions of women continued to be recorded, even if the contemporary evidence indicates that, at the same time, 17

See Chapter 5. DRH B, 2, No. 196 (1520). 19 I have borrowed here the expression of Erik Fügedi. See FÜGEDI, The Elefánthy: The Hungarian Boyar and His Kindred, p. 27. 18

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dowries were also being given in land. For instance, an early case (1515) specifies that lack of horses prompted a family to give their daughter a landed estate as dowry.20 I assume that the many deviations from the customary norm led to a societal change: women began to be considered potential inheritors of land without the fiction of their being turned into men. However, women in Wallachia could not yet inherit land by default. What changed was, that the landowning father acquired the right of free disposition and became able to grant his landed property to any of his offspring, irrespective of gender. As yet the inclusion of a landed estate in the dowry of a daughter was not a standard practice: it had to be confirmed by a formal donation recorded either in a written charter or in the living memory of witnesses. Gradually, charters confirming land given as a dowry began to be commissioned even by free peasants. By the end of the sixteenth century, a village community commissioned a charter to certify that their neighbour (fellow) Cireºco had given a share of his land as dowry for his daughter: “(...) so that it shall be known that Cireºco from Pupezeni gave a piece of land to his daughter Stana, wife of Dobroslav, son of Stanciul Strezoiul from Dobroþei as dowry (...)”.21 The practice began to change the norm: a male descendant also needed a formal donation to prove succession sub specie sexus, otherwise family lands were divided equally among all siblings. Consequently, the use of written land records continued its steady increase in Wallachia. Written records were commissioned either to secure donations to a single heir or to share out family land equally among siblings.22 This proliferation of documents results especially from the many title deeds issued as a result of disputes contesting previous land succession settlements.23 For instance, a trial before the prince in 1568 indicates that a male heir could not prove his exclusive right to inherit family land without his claim being endorsed by a formal donation: (...) jupâniþa Muºa had a trial with her brother Tudor before the late prince Pãtraºcu for the above-named village [Valea Lupului]. Tudor wanted to disown his sister, jupâniþa Muºa, so that she does not have any claim to the above-named village. And Tudor engaged that next to 12 boyars, before the late prince Pãtraºcu, 20

DRH B,

21

DRH B,

2, No. 129 (1515). 11, No. 163 (1595). Unfortunately, the text is only preserved in a monastic cartulary of 1847. 22 DRH B, 6, No. 93 (1568). 23 See, among many other examples, DRH B, 4, No. 97 (1539) and No. 98; DRH B, 6, No. 92 (1568), No. 97, No. 98, No. 110, and No. 216 (1570); DIR B, 5, No. 148 (1583).

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he would take an oath that his sister, jupâniþa Muºa, does not have any right over the village. And they could not take the oath and Tudor lost the case before prince Pãtraºcu. And after that, Tudor, unwilling to give up, came before our highness [and asked for another trial]. And our highness deliberated and judged, according to law and justice, with all the true officials of our highness. And our highness has seen and read the book of late prince Pãtraºcu, regarding how Tudor lost the case before his highness. Likewise, Tudor lost the case in front of our highness (...).24

Elderly women, apparently encouraged by the new practices, made retroactive complaints concerning earlier cases of partitioning family estates sub specie sexus, presumably carried out in their youth. They attacked their brothers’ inheritance rights and claimed that they too were entitled to the estates of the family: (...) And after this, chancellor Codrea and his jupâniþa Anca had a trial before our highness with their aunt Voica. And Voica was claiming before our highness that her father, Oancea pitar set her to be ‘brother’ with Isup, son of Oancea pitar. And for this our highness searched according to the truth and law, with all truthful servants of our highness. And I myself read the book of prince Radu the Monk, and the book of prince Mircea and the book of prince Pãtraºcu, all stating, by the oath of twelve boyars, that Voica had lost the case before other princes, because Voica was not entitled to those estates and those Gypsies. And chancellor Codrea and his jupâniþa Anca testified before our highness and in before the servant of our highness chancellor Neagu with 42 boyars that their aunt Voica was not entitled to own the estates of her father, Oancea pitar, and her brother Isup. And Voica lost the case before our highness (...).25

Other cases also testify that more often than not women’s retroactive claims were declared groundless by the princes judging these cases. However, the struggle of many landowners to avoid the customary restrictions and enable their daughter to inherit their land marks a change in the customary practice that previously had denied Wallachian women access to family land. It led to more use of charters and to their constantly widening use in enshrining both the prerogative of landowners to freely dispose of their landed property and the right of women to inherit land.

24

DRH B,

25

DRH B,

6, No. 92 (1568). 6, No. 110 (1568).

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The Practice of Fraternal Adoptions Used as Proto-Testaments The evidence points to an ever-increasing number of princely charters being issued to underwrite the practice of fraternal adoption, not only by landowners without male heirs but also by a variety of boyars striving to ensure free land succession. Initially, this practice is recorded mainly among highstatus kin-related nobility. Brothers and sisters,26 husbands and wives,27 uncles and nephews, along with other pairs of relatives,28 all turned each other into reciprocal brothers to secure the desired succession of their estates. The frequent use of the practice between spouses so as to grant a potential widow access to her husband’s lands is noteworthy. In Wallachian customary law, blood relationship determined land succession, and spouses were excluded from inheriting family estates. After their husbands’ death, widows were entitled to their dowry and nothing more.29 It seems that a sixteenth-century Wallachian widow could inherit her deceased spouse’s land only through princely favour recorded in a written contract. These contracts incorporated the practice of fraternal adoption. For example, in 1574 one of the highest Wallachian officials, jupan ban Drãghici, and his wife, jupâniþa Vlãdaia, came before the prince: “(...) to join themselves in brotherhood in before our highness over all above-written estates, and ponds, and mills, and vineyards and movable goods and silver and gold (...)”.30 The contract was conditional, in that it was to be nullified if either party entered upon a new marriage: (...) if jupâniþa Vlãdaia, after her husband’s death, will not be able to restrain herself and live without a husband, and thus she shall marry, or also if jupan Drãghici ban shall marry after jupâniþa Vlãdaia’s death, this agreement and brotherhood shall be terminated and they shall keep what they had each inherited (...).31

These agreements are specific to spouses without male heirs, and often the ultimate potential beneficiaries of their land were monastic institutions. Monastic cartularies record contracts of spouses which entitled them to reciprocal inheritance of landed estates: 26 27 28 29 30 31

See, e.g. DRH B, 5, No. 220 (1561). 5, No. 27 (1554); DRH B, 7, No. 180 (1574). See, e.g. DRH B, 5, No. 245 (1562); DRH B, 11, No. 295 (1598). See, e.g. DRH B, 7, No. 180 (1574). DRH B, 7, No. 180 (1574). The original charter is poorly preserved and incomplete. ibid. DRH B,

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(...) Chancellor (jupan) Codrea and his jupâniþa Anca came before our highness to fraternise over all of the above-named estates and villages and Gypsies, since they had no sons together. Whichever of them shall encounter death first, the other one shall keep all the above-named estates and pay for memorial services. If death shall occur to both of them at the same time and no one shall survive, neither sons, nor daughters, these above-named estates and wealth shall go to a holy monastery, where they shall entrust themselves when death occurs (...).32

It is possibly that the practice has its origins in old Germanic law, under which wills could not legitimise any bequest of land that fell outside customary practice; wills were accepted only in respect of consanguinity.33 We find the same practices recorded in neighbouring Hungary.34 In Austria too, similar practices were put to use to entitle a widow to inherit land after the death of her spouse.35 On occasion women act as rightful owners of land and commission princely charters to bestow their lands according to their free will, appealing to the same practices that had entitled them themselves to inherit land. For instance, jupâniþa Stana, wife of chamberlain (postelnic) Deatco, came before prince Radu the Great (1493-1507) to turn her sister into a ‘blood brother’ and thus grant her the status of inheritor of her purchased land: (...) for she, jupâniþa Stana set up her sister to be like her brother. But as long as jupâniþa Stana will remain alive she shall own her estates and slaves; and only after her death shall her estates belong to her sister Maria. In case death will strike jupâniþa Maria as well, the estates and the Gipsy slaves written above shall all belong to jupâniþa Stana’s son, Deatco, son of chamberlain (postelnic) Deatco (...).36

Note that this charter was not issued as a consequence of defectus seminis, as Stana’s son is mentioned in the record. It was rather intended as a testament entitling Stana to dispose of her purchased land freely; this suggests a transi-

32

DRH B, 7, No. 46 (1571). The copy is recorded in a late register belonging to Viero Monastery. See DRH B, 7, No. 46 (1571). 33 Cf. W. BRAUNEDER, “Different ways of succession by customary law in Austria”, in: Actes à cause de mort – Acts of Last Will, 2 vols. (Bruxelles, 1993: Recueil de la Société Jean Bodin 60), 2, pp. 297-312, at p. 299. 34 See FÜGEDI, The Elefánthy, p. 27; RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 107; I am grateful to Prof. János Bak for interesting discussions around this issue. 35 BRAUNEDER, “Different ways of succession by customary law in Austria”, p. 300. 36 DRH B, 1, No. 294 (1499).

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tion period from oral donations to written documents as a means to help secure free land succession. To sum up, charters were infrequently used by Wallachian landowners during the fifteenth century. Only exceptional situations such as the desire of land owners to dispose freely of their land led to the use and dissemination of written land records.

Economic Crisis, Social Conflict, and the Use of Written Records to Endorse the Rights of Protimissis All along the sixteenth century, we see a consistent increase in mobility in the ownership of land, especially in Wallachia. Land was sold as a consequence of the extremely high taxes imposed by the Ottoman Empire, especially after the middle of the sixteenth century.37 This was made easier by the ongoing changes in the structure of land ownership and the shift in property rights from collective ownership towards individual land holdings.38 Approximately one third of the extant charters record sales of individual holdings. The evidence often unequivocally specifies that land was sold because of high taxes. Goods received in exchange for land, such as lard, cheese, and cows, testify to a deep economic crisis.39 We also read in the surviving evidence that people often sold their land “during a period of bad famine”. Such descriptions are recurrent in sixteenth-century charters contesting former transfers of land which had taken place during the reigns of Vlad the Monk (1482-1495), Radu the Great (1495-1508), and, later on, Mircea the Shepherd (I, 1545-1552; II, 1558-59).40 These same reigns are characterised by a more active use of land records, indicating that social and economic turmoil had a say in the spread of charter use. Court officials are the earliest and most active forces behind the demand for charters for the newly purchased estates. 37

The Wallachian taxes increased tenfold, from 10,000 golden coins paid before 1462 to 104,000 golden coins in 1574-1583. See B. MURGESCU “Comerþ ºi politicã în Relaþiile românootomane”, in: ID., Þãrile Române intre Imperiul Otoman ºi Europa Creºtinã, p. 174; In Moldavia, taxes were raised from a rather symbolic 2000 golden coins paid for the first time in 1456 to 66,000 in 1583. See ibid., p. 174 and note 8); See also ID., România ºi Europa, p. 40. 38 STAHL, The Traditional Romanian Village Communities, p. 165. 39 See, e.g. DRH B, 4, No. 129 (c. 1542-1543), No. 152 (1543), and No. 173 (1545). 40 See among many others, DRH B, 7, No. 129 (1573); DRH B, 8, No. 271 (1579) and No. 325 (1580).

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As the right of pre-emption was a strong feature of Wallachian customary law, Wallachian boyars were unable to buy land from strangers.41 To overcome this, they appealed to the juridical fiction of fraternal adoption. We can see that the practice of fraternal adoption, previously used to secure uncustomary land donations among kin, began to legitimise a disguised land sale via instrumental fraternal adoptions outside kin-related groups.42 As free village communities owned land collectively, a boyar wishing to acquire their land (or parts of it) could do so only by becoming the ‘brother’ of one of the villagers, and thus becoming a member of the community. People joined by brotherhood not only had mutual rights to inherit estates, they could also purchase the land of a ‘brother’ or of his fellows through the right of pre-emption. The acquisition of a plot of land in a village of free peasants entitled a boyar to buy the remaining land of the villagers unhindered.43 From the reign of Mihnea the Bad (15081509) onwards, charters recording fraternal adoption between state officials and smaller land owners became quite frequent.44 The pledge of a part of a landed estate as a future inheritance through the practice of fraternal adoption in exchange for the payment of taxes or for various movable goods seems to have been seen as a solution by many distressed small landholders. For instance, in a charter commissioned by a certain Neagul to confirm his multiple land purchases, it is mentioned that a piece of land had previously belonged to a certain Mereuþã, who (...) was adopted as a brother by Muºat, and the adopted brother paid all Mereuþã’s taxes, and gave him 100 silver coins, a truckle of cheese, a smoked pork leg, and a woolen coat costing 60 silver coins.45

41 Gh. CRONÞ, Instituþii medievale româneºti: Înfrãþirea de moºie: Jurãtorii [Medieval Romanian institutions: Brotherhood over land: Oath helpers] (Bucharest, 1969), pp. 31-70. 42 For the practice of fraternal adoption among different social strata, see STAHL, Satele devãlmaºe, 3, p. 193; C. CODARCEA, Société et pouvoir en Valachie (1601-1654) entre la coutume et la loi (Bucharest, 2002), pp. 193-194. 43 See, e.g. DRH B, 11, No. 125, No. 129, and No. 130. In some cases, numerous purchases from individual peasants or peasant communities, who sold themselves together with their strip of land, were recorded in a single charter commissioned by a prince or, more often, by a court official. See, e.g. DRH B, 11, No. 186, No. 189, No. 314, No. 337, No. 338, and No. 339. 44 DRH B, 2, No. 63 (1509), No. 137 (1515), and especially No. 196 (1520); See also DRH B, 4, No. 144 (1543); DRH B, 5, No. 47 (1555), No. 315 (1565), and No. 320 (1565); DRH B, 6, No. 233 (1570); DRH B, 7, No. 52 (1571). 45 DRH B, 4, No. 280 (c. 1549-1552).

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In another charter, issued to record the countless land acquisitions of chancellor Coresi, the practice of fraternal adoption was put to use as well. It was also rewarded in movable goods: “(...) And jupan Coresi, the chancellor, as a reward for being adopted as brother, clothed Stanciul in a coat, in garments, and also in his high regard and care”.46 A clear-cut case is offered by the title deed of Detco, grand provost marshal. Lord of 26 villages, he was keen to purchase land from various owners, who had to adopt him as a brother. Detco’s charter of endowment stipulates: (...) And again, the entire village of Recica of Dabul [owned by Radomir], with its entire borders, shall belong to jupan Detco provost marshal (armaº), since Radomir alone came before our highness and willingly adopted jupan Detco as a brother and gave him half of his village, which he possessed at Recica, while the second half he sold to jupan Detco for 1000 silver coins and for a horse and for the payment of a debt. And jupan Detco provost marshal bought also other estates in [the village of] Recica of Dabul from Dahna, his part entirely, for 17 oxen, 30 sheep and 300 silver coins. And he also bought in Recica the entire part of Stanciul for 1000 silver coins. And he bought from Staicu all his parts from Recica of Dabul, for 450 silver coins.47

We see the entire process unfolding: to be able to buy shares of land belonging to village community members, Detco, the boyar, ‘purchases’ first his brotherhood, via Radomir’s fraternal adoption. Once a member of the community, he proceeds to expand his estates, acquiring the land shares of Dahna, Stanciul, and Staicu. We notice a consistent increase in the use of charters by secular land owners. It seems that ‘adopted brothers’ were keen to use every means of confirmation, including written records. In certain cases, we even see the falsification of charters recording a fraternal adoption.48 At the same time, the commissioning of a charter did not involve abandoning the older oral rituals. Besides through charters, agreements were secured by oral rituals such as oath-taking on Gospel books and secular banquets (adãlmaº) attended by large numbers of guests. Some charters mention the high costs in fattened pigs and wine of the banquets. Indeed, the costs involved in the oral rituals might have been higher than the price paid for the charter, as one charter commissioned in the last decades of 46 47 48

DRH B,

11, No. 232 (c. 1575-6). 4, No. 144 (1543). DRH B, 5, No. 52 (1555). DRH B,

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the sixteenth century mentions that 230 silver coins were spent on fattened pigs and wine, and only 50 silver coins on the written record.49 The rituals and their costs suggests that written documents as proof of ownership were imagined only alongside established oral procedures and rituals. The oral dimension of the property transfer may have been seen as more salient (and therefore more costly) than the written document. The large audience was intended to authenticate the contract, to make it public, and to make sure there were witnesses for possible future disputes.50 This was not an unwarranted worry, as cases contesting former land transactions through fraternal adoption are recurrent after the mid-sixteenth century.51 When this was the case, the parties had to take part in a trial before the prince in order to cancel the agreements that had been made previously. The evidence testifies that, at least in some cases, the prince preserved the agreements regardless of the circumstance that one of the parties had renounced the ‘adopted brotherhood’.52 Conflicts over land resulted in many charters issued as a result of a judicial process. Of the 154 deeds that survive from Mircea the Shepherd’s first period of rule (1545-1552), 65 record disputes over land. By contrast, for the longer reign of Radu the Great half a century earlier (1495-1508), we have 99 charters in all, 54 produced on behalf of laymen, but only 14 of the total recording disputes over property. Gradually, the ever-increasing use of written evidence throughout the sixteenth century led to the common practice, at the end of the century, that a land transfer at the princely court was expected to be recorded in writing. Land conveyance without recourse to the written word, at least among boyars, was perceived as exceptional; it had to be justified by reference to extraordinary situations such as political instability, for instance following the exile or death of the prince. A land donation made at an unknown date by the former palatine (vornic) Dragomir to chamberlain (postelnic) Pârvu was accomplished only “by his tongue as Dragomir was unable to write a charter since Prince Mihnea had been banished from the Wallachian throne and Dragomir had to follow him into exile”. On his death bed, in 1592, Dragomir reiterated the donation “by word of mouth”, and supported it with anathema urging his son to give the village in question to chamberlain Pârvu:

49

DRH B, 8, No. 97. Cf. ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, pp. 95-96. 51 DRH B, 5, No. 7 (1551). 52 DRH B, 5, No. 11. For more information about the practice and about rituals accompanying it, see CODARCEA, Société et pouvoir en Vallachie, pp. 192-201, 340-350. 50

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(...) Jupan Dragomir former grand palatine (fost mare vornic), wishing to avoid sin, he himself, jupan Dragomir grand palatine, by his tongue, had decided and gave the village of Ciocovenii in the hands of chamberlain (postelnic) Pârvu (...); since prince Mihnea had been removed from the Wallachian throne, he was not able to commission a book [charter], as it came about that [Dragomir], the honoured court official and boyar, former grand palatine, had to follow him in his exile to the Moldavian lands. And on his deathbed he again summoned his son, jupan Pãtru, former grand sword-bearer (mare spãtar), by his tongue and by terrible anathema and fearful constraints that nobody else shall interfere with that estate besides chamberlain Pârvu, who shall be lord of the village of Ciocovenii, since it is his rightful inheritance. And after a while, when our Lord had given back the princedom of Wallachia to prince Mihnea and jupan Pãtru spãtarul was able to return to the country of Wallachia, prince Mihnea made a book for chamberlain Pârvul so that he could hold Cociovenii, his share (...).53

As the charter suggests, by the end of the sixteenth century, for a Wallachian court official a land conveyed twice “by word of mouth” was no longer a reliable donation, even if it was supported by a traditional anathema. The son of the governor therefore came before the prince and made an ‘adequate’ donation, i.e. a written charter. This means that, at least for high-ranking state officials, any land endowment had to be supported by a written record. Additionally, we witness a more extended spread of written records in the social fabric of Wallachia. Free village communities and individual villagers began to commission princely charters recording their possessions of plots of land.54 The surviving written evidence belonging to Radovanu village is one of the most illustrative cases that reached us. Fourteen of the twenty-four surviving charters commissioned by free village communities during the reign of Michael the Brave concern this village. These charters were preserved in the cartulary of Bucovãþu monastery, which explains their survival, but they may nonetheless be considered illustrative of more general trends. The Radovanul case involved members of the village community, both individually and collectively, who commissioned princely charters for their landed estates or challenged the sale of their land to Coºuna monastery.55 The village estate had previously been sold to a court official, as we learn from a document of 1558, when 37 villagers repurchased their land from the chamberlain Marcea for 217 53 54 55

DRH B,

11, No. 182 (1596). 4, No. 76, No. 117, and No. 142; DRH B, 5, No. 111. The charter is preserved in a late monastic cartulary. See DRH, 11, No. 186, p. 248. DRH B,

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cows and 8,500 silver coins.56 Clearly, some conflict was already present, as is suggested by the village commissioning four charters to show evidence of their rights to the land.57 A generation later, the villagers, some apparently feeling the burden of high taxation, sold their estates again ‘willingly’ to Coºuna monastery for 24,000 silver coins.58 We see here in succession the sale of land to a high dignitary, the repossession of the land sold by the community, and then a further round of forced sales and dispossessions. The very existence of a princely charter commissioned by the villagers, its wording, and the full list of the highest state officials witnessing the confirmation suggest a conflict and pressure upon the remaining peasants to sell their shares together with the rest of the village community. They had to go all the way to the prince to secure a charter in order to protect themselves from “the oppression of the monks”.59 In the multiple acquisitions of landed property from free villagers not all members of the community sold their estates. Those peasants who were able to preserve their land, took the pain of having their ownership confirmed in writing by the prince: With God’s grace, Io Mikhail, prince and master of the entire country of Wallachia, son of the great and good late prince Pãtraºcu. And we, our highness, gave this order to Tatu and Moº and to their sons, as many as God shall bless them with, so that they shall hold a landed estate at Radovanul, one share, the entire share of their father, Iovan Popoveanul, as much as it can be chosen from the entire estate of arable land and of forest and of water and of the hills with vineyards and of mills and from everywhere, since this above-written estate is their old and true possession inherited from early times by Iovan Popoveanul. And again Iovan, son of Minea shall possess one share and five feet of estate in the village of Radovanul, the entire share of his father Minea, as much as shall be marked from the entire estate and from every part because this above-written landed estate was their old and true estate inherited and purchased from earlier times, since the times of prince Mircea. Afterwards, in the days of my reign, the other villagers from the village of Radovanul had sold their shares of the estate to the holy godly monastery that is called Coºuna, near Craiova; but Tatul and Moº, sons of Iovan, and Iovan, son of Minea, had by all means refused to sell their shares of the estate, but left those shares to be their inherited estates for ever. For this reason, our highness gave to Tatul and Moº and to Iovan son of Minea, to hold their estates as inherited, to them 56 57 58 59

DRH B,

5, No. 116 (1558). 6, No. 52 (1568). DRH B, 11, No. 60 (1594). Later evidence shows that Tatul and Mo were not able to keep their land. DRH B,

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Fig. 19 Prince Radu confirms the property of the villagers of Vaideea after a dispute with three other villages; formerly preserved at Bistri a Monastery. 1504. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 136. Photo: Mariana Goina. and their sons and grandsons and great-grandsons and to be touched by nobody, and they shall not endure the monks’ oppression, or oppression from any others, from now on. And our highness put as witnesses jupan Ivan, grand palatine (mare vornic), and jupan Chisar, grand chancellor (mare jupan), and jupan Theodosie, grand treasurer (mare vistiernic), and jupan Theodosie, grand sword-bearer (mare spãtar), and jupan Radul, grand master of the court (mare clucer), and jupan Stroe, grand seneschal (mare stolnic), and jupan Radul, grand master of the horse (mare comis), and jupan Erban, grand cup bearer (mare paharnic), and jupan Preda, grand chamberlain (mare postelnic). And in charge shall be jupan Chisar, grand chancellor (ispravnic). And, I, Stanciul wrote it, at Târgoviºte, July 29 days and from the world’s creation and from Adam to our days, the year 7104 and a half. Io prince Mihai.60

60 The charter is preserved in a late translation recorded in a monastic cartulary. See DRH B, 11, No. 186, p. 248.

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Seemingly, there was pressure on the remaining villagers to sell their shares, as some of them protested against surrendering their land to the monastery. For example, Oprea, one of the village priests, fought for more than two years to have his landed estate returned to him. In the process of his fight, he caused at least four charters to be issued.61 Many peasants were forced by circumstances to sell, but a few, like priest Oprea, had sufficient resources to choose not to. The pressure applied by the land purchaser, in this instance the monastery, in the end was enough to overcome his resistance. Villagers increasingly came to be involved in written practices no longer as humble sellers but as commissioners of documents attesting their possessions of individual plots of land.62 In doing so, they avoided becoming the prey of powerful boyars who became their ‘brothers’ through the sale of a co-villager’s land. The stakes of this struggle were high, as in the medieval Romanian principalities only landowners could preserve their free status. Once the peasants lost or sold their share, they became serfs.63 A written record stating that village sales had been only partial was undoubtedly a measure to protect villagers who were struggling to remain free. In those happy cases when whole villages, as well as the individual landholders, were able to purchase or repurchase individually or collectively their plots of land, they also took steps to secure their regained freedom by a title deed. As a result, a local gentry of free peasants (and even of dependent peasants) began to be recorded as commissioners of charters attesting their rights of property.64 The number of princely charters commissioned by village communities grew, especially during the reign of Michael the Brave (1593-1601), when they amounted to one third of the surviving charters dealing with disputes over land (18 out of 51 charters). After the turn of the seventeenth century, the evidence testifies that even serfs might now appear as commissioners of written documents. For instance, the freeing of tenants as an act of piety by a court official, grand provost marshal Gligorie, is recorded in a deed. Later, the beneficiaries commissioned a princely charter the better to support their change in status.65 61 His struggle was recorded in four surviving charters, three of them issued by the office of the ban of Craiova (DRH B, 11, No. 152 (1596), No. 153 (1596), and No. 202 (1596)); one of his charters was issued in the princely chancery (DRH B, 11, No. 279 (1598)). For other villagers, see, e.g. DRH B, 11, No. 186 (1596) and No. 225 (1597). 62 DRH B, 4, No. 76, No. 117, and No. 142; DRH B, 5, No. 111. 63 DRH B, 5, No. 11, No. 303, and No. 331. 64 DRH B, 7, No. 135, No. 161, and No. 251. 65 DIR A, 4, No. 448 (1624).

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Princely expectation that land owners, however lowly their status, had to confirm their land in writing was not long in coming. In a charter from 1589, the villagers of Vãrbiþa were summoned before the prince “with their books for their village” as a result of a complaint made by the Tismana monastery.66 Likewise, in 1592 the Wallachian prince asked a landowner how he dared to take the estate of a monastery “without any law and any book”, thereby implying that a land transfer was supposed to be recorded in written form.67 By the end of the sixteenth century, the Wallachian evidence suggests that the practice of recording estates in writing was no longer restricted to boyars. Wallachian peasants also joined in the process of using written records, but, as elsewhere, the peasants’ exposure to written practices was reactive: it originated in response to pragmatic needs to protect their lands and freedom.68

Moldavian Charters and Their Use From the long and stable reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1425) onwards, Moldavian laymen are repeatedly recorded as commissioners of princely charters. It seems that they began to use title deeds more regularly at least two generations earlier than their Wallachian counterparts, despite the later foundation of the Moldavian state institutions. The earliest surviving Moldavian charters do not mention whether information about the recorded estates had previously been already put into writing. The surviving charters testify only to the fact that Moldavian boyars were commissioning these records not only for their new land conveyances but also for their earlier land holdings. Sometimes the villages that are confirmed in writing are described as being owned by the family from “earlier times”, and as places where “the house of their grandfather was built”.69 Some of the recorded villages bear the names of their owners, and places are referred to as “where the house of the owner is situated”: By God’s grace, we, voivod Alexandru, prince of the Moldavian country. Let it be known, by this book of ours, to all those who shall see it or hear it read that our true servant, Onicica, was a trusted and righteous servant of ours. Seeing his deference 66 67 68 69

DIR B,

6, No. 406 (c. 1589). 6, No. 82 (1593). Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 49. DIR A, 1, No. 47 (1507). DIR B,

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and rightful service, we bestowed upon him our grace and endowed him with a village in our country, a village at Cârligãtura, where his house is built, so that this shall be his property with its entire revenue, to him, and his children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren and to all his kin touched by nobody for ever (...). 70

Two years later Alexandru the Good “bestowed his grace” on another of his trusted servants, Crãciun Purcelescu, and “strengthened” his possession, the village Purceleºti, “where his house is built”, by his princely charter.71 While in the first charter cited the wording “where his house is built” may be a mere formula, in the second it is clear that the village of Purceleºti was already owned by (and named after) the Purcelescu family. It remains unclear why Moldavian boyars had not previously used written records for recording their property, and why they began confirming their estates in writing in the first quarter of the fifteenth century. A possible explanation may be that only by that time the princely chancery was established enough to be able to provide them with written records of their landed estates. As mentioned before, in Moldavia secular charters were commissioned for ordinary land endowments and conveyances. Moldavian women seem fully entitled to inherit land property, either as daughters, next to their male siblings, or as widows.72 Moldavian charters use ‘children’ and not ‘sons’ to designate future potential inheritors – as in “to him, and his children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren and to all his kin”. Wallachian charters always use ‘sons’ in the corresponding formula. Presumably, the difference stems from the different treatment of women in the customary laws of the two principalities, as in Moldavia there are no attested gender distinctions with respect to land inheritance rights in the evidence surviving from the fifteenth century. It is worth noting that not a single surviving Moldavian charter was commissioned for circumventing customary law restrictions regarding the inheritance of family landed estates. We may therefore assume free rights of land succession and equality between male and female heirs. There is a consistency in the evidence 70

DRH A,

71

DRH A,

1, No. 66 (1427) and No. 45 (1419). 1, No. 82 (1429). 72 The right of Moldavian women to inherit family land was another disputed issue in Romanian and Moldovan historiography. Some sixteenth-century evidence led STAHL consider that Moldavian women were also denied the access to family land. Cf. STAHL, Traditional Romanian Village Communities, p. 154; Conversely, other historians argued that Moldavian males and females always enjoyed equal rights in inheriting family land. Cf. M. CAZACU “La famille et le statut de la femme en Moldavie (XIVe-XIXe siècles)” Revista de istorie Sociala 2-3 (1997-1998), pp. 1-16, at pp. 9-10.

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that, in medieval Moldavia, women could not only inherit family land as offspring, but also as widows. From the early fifteenth century onwards, the Moldavian charter evidence also points to Moldavian noblewomen as very active commissioners of princely charters to confirm, donate, or sell their estates.73 One of the first extant charters to record a land bequest within the family was commissioned by a Moldavian woman, Maruºca Stroiasa, who came before the prince to endow her grandson with a village.74 Often these female commissioners of written records seem to be widows. For example, in 1477 Muºa, wife of Vindereu, confirmed her village, Vinderei, which she had inherited from her late husband, as the charter records. It is mentioned that before commissioning this charter she had owned other written records, which had been destroyed during the Ottoman raids.75 Moldavian women were also entitled to initiate pleas before the prince. The first surviving plaint recorded in writing is brought before the princely court by a widowed Moldavian noblewoman, Maicolea, and her sons.76 By the end of the fifteenth century, Moldavian women were extremely active in the commissioning of written land records, their number almost matching (if not exceeding) that of the men who commissioned charters.77 From late in the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504) onwards, the Moldavian data point to a process of transition from patriarchal to individual possessions, as in Wallachia. The partition of large land holdings begins to be recorded regularly in the Moldavian charters after the turn of the sixteenth century. Extended families came before the Moldavian princes to divide their family estates between them and to have them recorded in writing. In most cases a single charter was issued to all the family members, indicating each sibling’s share: By God’s grace, we prince Stephen, prince of the Moldavian country. Let it be known, by this book of ours to all those that shall see it or hear it read that Marena and her brothers, pan Gãnescul, constable (pârcãlab) of Neamþ fortress, and pan Cozma ªarpe, chamberlain (postelnic), and their sister, Magdalina, came before us 73

See, e.g. DRH A, 1, No. 113 (1433); DRH A, 2, No. 219 and No. 228; DRH A, 3, No. 94, No. 211, No. 230, No. 231, and passim. 74 DRH A, 2, No. 27. 75 DRH A, 2, No. 209. 76 DRH A, 1, No. 42 (1418). 77 See, e.g. DRH A, 3, No. 230, No. 231, No. 233, No. 273, and No. 277.

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and before our Moldavian boyars and willingly, and by nobody constrained and forced, divided their true estates according to their true charters. The village of Voineºti from the field of Cârligãtura and the village of Cucuieºti was allocated to Marena; they had inherited this village Cucuieºti from their cousin Stanca. And again to pan Ion Gãnescul, pârcãlab of Neamþ fortress, was allocated the village of Gãneºti, where his manor is located and the village of Dãjbideni; and they inherited this village Dãjbideni from their cousin Stanca. And again to pan Cozma ªarpe, chamberlain, was allocated the village of Ciunceºti, which is now called Cârsteºti, in the field of Cârligãtura. And again, as Marena’s share was allotted a village, namely Coseºti, also in the field of Cârligãtura. And again, those shares from the other villages that are hers, she had given them to her brothers, our trustful pan Ion Gãnescul pârcãlab of Neamþ fortress and pan ªarpe postelnic, and to her sister Marena. And instead they shall not own anything in Mândreºti, never, forever (...).78

The villages’possession had previously been confirmed in writing. The new charter was still collective, recording the full holdings of the extended family; its novelty consisted in the way the details of the possessions of each family member were specified in the collective charter. These details were now not only stored in the family memory as before, but were recorded in writing as well. It seems that written titles to land were perceived as extra means of proof and guarantees of possession. It is noteworthy that Marena is listed first among the commissioners of the charter. It can thus be argued that one of the earliest charters to record a family land partition was commissioned by a Moldavian noblewoman.79 The sixteenth-century Moldavian evidence shows that land charters were produced chiefly for regular land conveyances or partitions of jointly held landed estates. Commonly held estates of large patriarchal families that had previously been divided among nuclear families were divided again between the siblings of nuclear families. Over the span of a century the division of collectively owned land is mentioned time and again, while the selling of individual shares of estates is also a recurrent theme.80 In the process, the number of surviving charters increases, reaching at times more that twenty per year by the middle of the sixteenth century compared to three per year during the reign of 78

DIR A,

79

DRH A,

1, No. 106 (1517). 3, No. 108 (17 March 1492). 80 See, e.g. DIR A, 4, No. 45 (1591): twelve landowners came one after another and sold their individual shares of Vîrtop village for a small amount of money to Andreica, a former court official.

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Alexandru the Good (1400-1432). In Romanian historical scholarship this increase in the number of charters is seen as being related to the long period of political stability that characterised the latter part of Stephen the Great’s reign.81 In my reading of the data, the increase in the use of charters attested during the reign of Stephen the Great is a consequence of social changes and of the concomitant partitioning of collectively owned estates. Beginning with the last part of the reign of Stephen the Great, sales of land increased to an unprecedented extent.82 Many owners of estates, often former high court officials or their offspring, came collectively before the prince to sell villages they had inherited from their ancestors. Some sales are repeatedly contested, especially by the reign of Petru the Lame.83 Unfortunately, the motives for the sales are not known. The schematic Moldavian charters are less specific about economic or social crises. However, that most of the charters preserved involve a large estate sold by many vendors to a single purchaser, usually a high court official, may indicate that the impoverishment of landowners was taking place in Moldavia as well.84 From time to time, after the midsixteenth century charters mention that movable goods, such as cloth or cattle, were given by the purchaser in exchange for land; this points to the same economic crisis we witnessed in the case of Wallachia.85 For instance, in 1546, a certain Olena sold half of the village she had inherited from her father to the Moldavian prince and asked for cloth and cattle and other useful goods in return.86 Likewise, Ion sold his land, inherited from his grandmother, for 200 gold coins and a good cow.87 Presumably, in Moldavia, as in Wallachia and in neighbouring Hungary, the expansion of the market for land also led to a surge in the commissioning of records. As Rady puts it:

81

S. GOROVEI and M.M. Székely, Princeps omni laude maior: O istorie a lui ªtefan cel Mare (Putna, 2005), pp. 249, 250, 257. 82 DIR A, 1, No. 52 (1507). Some land conveyances that apparently took place during the reign of Stephen the Great were recorded in writing at least several years later. See DIR A, 1, No. 71 (1508). 83 DIR A, 3, No. 274 and No. 282. 84 DIR A, 1, No. 42 (1506), charter recording that Giurgea Brudur, a scribe of the treasury, has purchased a landed estate sold by an extended family. 85 DIR A, 4, No. 45 (1591), No. 224 (1597), and No. 253. 86 DIR A, 1, No. 415 (1546). 87 DIR A, 4, No. 224 (1597).

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The breakup of communally held property resulted in a proliferation of smaller holdings, which were liable to further partition and dispersal. As one might expect, there was a corresponding flight into written record during the same period to confirm both long-standing titles and new transactions.88

More importantly, the repeated use of charters seems to have led gradually to a change in the ways they were used. Throughout the fifteenth century, a patriarchal family usually possessed only one single charter to confirm its landed estates: (...) By God’s grace, we, Bogdan voivod, prince of the Moldavian country. Let it be known by this book of ours to all that shall see or hear it read that our servants Duma and his brothers, Danciul and Furduiu and Filip and Ion and their sisters Fetiþa and Neaga, Marena’s children, and also their cousins Sima and his brothers Lazor and Andreica, and their sister Neacºa, Stana’s children, all of them grandchildren of Ivaºco, son of Hodco Ciumalã; all of them willingly and by nobody constrained or forced sold their estate, a village called Leveºti, [located] where it is called Levcuºeºti, to our servant Giurgea Brudur, treasury scribe (pisar de visterie), for four hundred Turkish golden coins according to their true charter, according to the charter of their great-grandfather Hodco Ciumalã, son of Ciumalã the eldest (...).89

As can be observed from the charter commissioned by the descendants of Hodco Ciumalã, this patriarchal family held their estates on the basis of a charter belonging to their ancestor, which seems to have remained unchanged in the family from one generation to the next for more than a century.90 The property goes back five generations to the founder (Ciumalã the elder), which coincides roughly with the founding of the Moldavian state. However, in this case it is not the founder who is mentioned as the owner of a princely charter certifying his estate, but his son Hodco, son of Ciumala the elder. We repeatedly observe offspring asserting the legitimacy of their possessions in land by using their ancestors’ charters of endowment. Seemingly, it was only the alienation of a family estate and the conveyance of the land to another family that was followed by commissioning a new document. From the reign of Rareº and his sons onwards, charters more often began to be produced whenever a new generation took possession. The schematic 88 89 90

RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, pp. 67-68. DIR A, 1, No. 42 (1506). DIR A, 1, No. 42 (1506).

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Moldavian records do not include details of ownership. Charters mention only that children are confirming the estates of their fathers or grandfathers, and that their predecessors likewise administered their estates on the strength of charters.91 However, land possession was not exclusively recorded in writing. Occasionally charters mention estates hitherto held without the confirmation of any written record.92 From the same period, in Moldavia charters began to be distinguished by type. It was specified whether a charter used in a land conveyance or a dispute had been produced as a consequence of the partition of commonly held estates or as a consequence of a land conveyance, and as such they were called either charters of partition or charters of endowment. As a consequence, a single family might own several charters for the same landed estate, depending on the changes that their estates had undergone. The previously schematic Moldavian charters began to include new details, as for example the history of the estate for four or five generations. In collective charters, each member was recorded with his or her share of land. In cases of collective purchase the amount of money paid by each branch of the family was specified: By God’s grace, we, prince Petru, master of the Moldavian country. Let it be known by this book of ours to all those that shall see it or hear it read that Odochia and her sister Geaca, Olena’s daughters, and Ilia and his sisters Dochia and Mãrica and Licea, Sofronia’s children, and Ion Herlic and his brother Condrea and their sister Mãrica, and Anton and his brother Vãscan, and Nastea and Nicoarã, children of Tudora, and Tãnase, and his brother Ignat, Stanca’s children, and Samoil and Alexa and Ionaºco and Hilip, Parasca’s children, all of them Ilca’s and palatine (vornic) Oanã’s grandchildren and great grandchildren, all willingly and by nobody constrained and forced sold their true estate, inherited through their true charter, their charter of partition, which their grandmother Ilca possessed from Stephen the Great; also from their charter of partition which was possessed by their grandmother Maruºca from prince Stephen the Younger and also from their deed of partition that they possessed from prince Iancu, half of the village of Rãciuleºti, the upper part, which is located on the [river] Prut; and they sold it to our servants, to Drãghich, tax collector (iliºar), and to Ursu and to Gavril and his wife Tudosia and to priest Gavril and to Anton, for five hundred Tartar golden coins. And our servants Drãghich iliºar and Ursu and Gavril and his wife Tudosia and priest Gavril and Anton paid entirely all this money, 500 Tartar golden coins, in the hands of the 91

DIR A,

92

DIR A,

1, No. 98 (1515) and No. 181; DRH A, 6, No. 30 (1548), No. 35, and No. 38. 1, No. 99 (1515).

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above-written grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Maruºca and Ilca and of palatine Oanã before us and before all our boyars. So that from all the above-written money, all had paid a share of a hundred Tartar golden coins so that they can divide the above-written estate in five parts, the part from above of the village of Rãciuleºti. One part shall belong to our servant, tax collector (iliºar) Drãghici, the other one to Ursu, the third part shall belong to Gavril and his wife Tudosia, the fourth part shall belong to priest Gavril and the fifth part to Anton (...).93 And from all this above-written money, they have all paid a share of a hundred Tartar golden coins, so that they can divide this above-written half of the village in five parts, namely the upper part of Rãciuleºti village. And one part shall belong to our servant Drãghici iliºar, another one shall belong to Ursu, the third part to Gavril and his wife Tudosia, the fourth part shall belong to the priest Gavril and the fifth part shall belong to Anton (...).94

In sixteenth-century Moldavia, we see that in the interplay between oral and written means of storing information the balance was gradually shifting to writing. Data presumably stored in the memory of the witnesses, such as the part of the village owned, the money paid by each buyer, and the share received, began to make their way into writing. This suggests that written records were read for their specific information or were expected to be read as such. And when earlier charters were mentioned in a land transaction, the name of the prince as its commissioner, presumably as the guarantor of its authenticity, was recorded.95 However, it often remains doubtful whether this information had any real basis or whether the name of the prince was added as a rhetorical device to add weight to the evidence. It does nonetheless suggests that the possession of written records issued by well-known princes was considered meaningful as a legitimating device. It would appear that written records were attempting to create a history, to replicate the ‘old’ memories of witnesses. To sum up, Moldavian boyars seem well acquainted with the use of written land records. Throughout the fifteenth century, they commission charters to record regular land ownership and conveyances. In Moldavia, unlike in Wallachia, inheriting land was not restricted to male offspring. Here, charters were commissioned for regular land transactions and partitions only. Moreover, in the sixteenth century we see that charters began to be commissioned even for 93

DIR A,

94

DIR A,

95

3, No. 266 (1583). 3, No. 266. DRH A, 6, No. 407 and No. 408.

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land transactions inside the family. Unfortunately, our information is restricted only to the noble class. There is almost no trace in the Moldavian evidence produced at the highest state level, in the chancery of the prince, of the spread of charters among other social strata. Up to the end of the sixteenth century, Moldavian free village communities scarcely appear as commissioners of princely charters. It seems that approaching the state chancery was restricted to boyars. Smaller landowners recorded their individual landed possessions or conveyances outside the princely chancery, using village priests or private notaries. ***

Several generations after the foundation of the Wallachian and Moldavian principalities, laymen turned to the use of documents. These documents were largely limited to records the possession of land. Only occasionally we have evidence suggesting that written records were used for other issues. Up to the mid-fifteenth century in Moldavia, and by the end of that century in Wallachia, we can speak only of an exceptional use of written land records. The earliest commissioners of charters are usually the highest court officials. In Wallachia the start of the use of written land records seems to have been triggered by exceptional situations. At the outset, here secular land owners used charters mainly to overcome customary law restrictions concerning land transactions (especially defectus seminis and protimissis). Written documents were seen as helpful instruments to guarantee any bequeathing of land that was not acceptable in customary law. After several generations of recurrent economic crises, in an economic context characterised by conflict over land we also witness the process of the spread of written land records throughout the social fabric. In the context of the attrition of free village communities and the expansion of large latifundia, the lesser nobility and free village communities appealed to written land records as a means of protecting their landed property.96 The unfolding of this process led to societal change and to a situation in which for a Wallachian boyar land conveyance was valid only if it was endorsed in writing. This requirement began 96

Cf. BEHRMANN, “The Development of Pragmatic Literacy in Lombard City Communes”, in Pragmatic Literacy, East and West, 1200-1330, ed. R. BRITNELL (Woodbridge, 1997), pp. 2543, at p. 40.

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to be imposed on landowners by the end of the sixteenth century. Thus, changes in land ownership and the increased vulnerability of small and medium-sized land holdings were transposed into a rapid Wallachian transition ‘from memory to written record’.97 Social transformation not only led to an increase in the number of charters issued on behalf of the high nobility, but throughout all different social strata. One can trace in Wallachia a similar situation to that signalled by Martyn Rady in neighbouring Hungary: “oral testimony formerly prevailed, not only on account of widespread illiteracy, but also because there was little perceived need for written instruments”.98 We can say that, in Wallachia as elsewhere, the use of written records was sparked by urgent pragmatic and utilitarian needs. By contrast, Moldavian boyars seem to confirm their landed estates in writing on a regular basis. The transition from collective to individual land holding, and the ensuing partitions of collective estates, only led to a further use of written titles to land. The fragmentation of communally held estates triggered mobility of land ownership and a still further increase in the use of written records. However, in Moldavia we see hardly any broadening of the use of princely charters to lower social strata; up to the end of the sixteenth century, the commissioners of princely charters seem restricted to boyars. The few extant deeds written on behalf of smaller landowners were issued outside the princely office. Moldavian peasants do not commission princely charters as yet. The social conflict over land attested in Wallachia is less visible in the Moldavian evidence.

97 98

I owe the expression to the classic work of Michael Clanchy. RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 64.

Chapter 7

Falsification of Charters n Wallachia and Moldavia, as elsewhere, the increase in the use of charters as proof of land ownership is matched by the growing practice of forging charters.1 I read this as another symptom of the increase in the imporance of written land records. After the mid-sixteenth century, the evidence from court proceedings often specifies that charters brought in as legal evidence had been found to be forged.2 Charters were either forged in their entirety, or untrue statements are inserted into original charters at a later date.3 The surviving evidence testifies mainly to the partial forging of land charters through erasures and the insertion of new information.4 Many surviving charters indicate that information related to the previous owners of the landed estate, its boundaries, or the amount of money paid for its acquisition were erased and altered.5 It appears that chancery scribes took an active part in the process. For instance, in a charter issued as a result of a dispute settlement, a tampered-with charter in which relatives of scribe Averescu were deprived of their landed property is mentioned.6 Despite the findings of this court case, however, the forged charter was not cancelled and, two centuries later, priest Sava had to undertake the task of its

I

1

Cf. M. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, pp. 38-39; BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 352. 2 For Moldavia see, for example, DIR A, 3, No. 60 (1575); for Wallachia, DRH B, 7, No. 156. 3 Cf. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, p. 37. 4 Cf. BOGDAN “Diplomatica slavo-românã din secolele XIV ºi XV”, 5-6, pp. 223-284, at pp. 226-230. 5 DRH B, 2 No. 112 (1512); DRH B, 6, No. 251 (1570); DRH B, 8, No. 113 (1578); DIR B, 6, No. 44 (1592); DRH B, 11, No. 336 (1599). 6 DIR A, 3, No. 84 (1576) and No. 230 (1558).

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Fig. 20 Tampered charter. Boundaries and witnessess erased, with new information written in. The original charter was comissioned by Prince Alexandru the Good and written by Bratei. 1403. Bucharest, National Archives, Biroul Arhive Medievale, Fonduri Personale ºi Colecþii, Depozit 1C, Manastirea Pobrata, VIII/1. Photo: Mariana Goina.

translation. Writing in 1773, he mentions that “(...) a part of the charter which recorded the boundary of the estate is wiped clean” and also that “the third part of the charter is entirely erased and it is not known what has been rubbed out”.7 Other instances testify that professionals of the written word forged family charters either on their own behalf, eliminating other siblings and trying to obtain a greater share of family land for themselves, or on behalf of strangers in exchange for money.8 Some chancery scribes seem to have misused their positions to such an extent that princes charged “all those who shall see the specific script of a certain scribe, namely Stoica from Mereºani, not to trust them [the charters written by him] since they are false and written without our [princely] knowledge since he [the scribe] possessed the princely seal and used it according to his will”.9 The punishments meted out to those who committed such forgeries were very harsh, either blinding or beheading. As Marco Mostert puts it, “the punishment mirrored the crime”.10 Indeed, the cruel penalties for tampering with charters indicate that this deception was perceived as a crime. It shows that the 7

3, p. 63-65. For Moldavia, see, e.g. DIR A, 1, No. 37 (1505) and No. 259; Cf. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, p. 54. 9 DIR B, 5, No. 260 (1586). 10 MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, p. 54. 8

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stern punishments that were common in late medieval Europe had reached Wallachia and Moldavia as well.11 Yet it is surprising to learn that in all the surviving recorded cases the forgers were spared. For instance, in 1586 Bratul falsified some title deeds so that he could obtain the estate of chancellor Nicula. The guilty scribe was sentenced to beheading, but the prince asked Nicula to blind him instead – and in fact Nicula granted him a complete pardon. So it seems that, despite the official severe punishments, in practice deceivers were often spared. We do not know how conclusions about forgery were reached, and whether such decisions were based on any textual or physical analysis of the documents. It is possible that the means of authentication recorded in the charters themselves, such as the dating clause, the witness list, or the handwriting of a scribe, were taken into consideration. Unfortunately, no recorded case gives any details about the decision-making process or about the procedures used to establish the authenticity of charters or to invalidate those proven to be forgeries.12 Some documents, when referring to an earlier charter, make mention of the handwriting of a known scribe as a mark of genuineness. This recognisable ‘hand’ of a scribe (as the charters refer to it) and referrals to the reigning princes are the only recorded references to possible means of checking a charter’s authenticity.13 Charters that were pronounced to be forgeries were cut into three pieces. This seems to have been the standard procedure for the invalidation of a forged charter; in Wallachia as elsewhere a document had to be in one piece to be legally valid.14 The high view taken of written records is emphasised once again by the fact that on occasion the separate parts of the cut-up charters were preserved over the centuries. To sum up, after the mid-sixteenth century the evidence testifies that the number of forged charters increased along with the wider use of written records as proofs of land possession. The failure of the state institutions to control forgery or their lack of interest in doing so, combined with their clemency toward deceivers, was – presumably – in part responsible for the increase in the number of forged charters.

11 12 13 14

For the Serbian case, see BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 353. Cf. ADAMSKA and MOSTERT, “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 699. DRH A, 2, No. 100 (1461). ADAMSKA and MOSTERT, “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 702.

Chapter 8

The Use of Written Evidence in Wallachian and Moldavian Dispute Settlements he surviving charters issued as a result of judicial hearings come almost exclusively from the office of the prince. Up to the eighteenth century and beyond, judiciary practice was exclusively oral. The outcomes of cases were recorded in writing only in the most important instances, with disputes over land appearing to dominate. The resulting land charters were the only instances of written documents mentioned during subsequent trials. The few known lawsuits unrelated to land possession appear to have been settled exclusively on the basis of oral testimony.1 Consequently, our understanding of the use of the written word in the judicial process is limited, as only land-related disputes used written evidence to a significant extent.2

T

The Wallachian Evidence In Wallachia, the use of charters at the princely court is mentioned for the first time very late in the fifteenth century, in 1490. The documents in question belonged to one of the earliest attested Wallachian monastic foundations, Tismana monastery. Not surprisingly, monastic institutions were pioneers in commissioning written records of their properties and in using them in the course of subsequent land disputes. After the first quarter of the sixteenth cen1

See, e.g. DIR A, 3, No. 438 (1587). Cf. Ch. WICKHAM, “Land disputes and their social framework in Lombard-Carolingian Italy, 700-900”, in: The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe, pp. 105-124, at p. 118. 2

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tury, the use of land charters gradually permeated Wallachian lay society.3 It is noteworthy that from the first quarter of the sixteenth century onwards, charters produced as a consequence of a judicial process account for a high proportion of all surviving charters. Apart from witnessing to people’s eagerness to safeguard their land this may also suggest a requirement that the resolutions of court cases be recorded in writing. In the earliest surviving princely charters issued as the result of a judicial process, the procedures are hardly described. The purpose of written records was to confirm the ownership of the contested estate, not to relate how the decision had been reached.

Orality as a Practice of Judicial Process Up to the mid-sixteenth century and sporadically afterwards, judicial practice, as far as we can tell, was an exclusively oral process. Collective oathtaking appears as virtually the only method of proof used.4 The collective oath (called ‘law’) was sworn by one of the contending parties along with their oath-helpers. The number of compurgators could vary; we find three, six, twelve, forty-eight or even higher numbers of oath-helpers being attested, depending upon the difficulty of the case.5 As a rule, twelve oath-helpers were needed in a property dispute, but each retrial of a case required a doubling of the previous number.6 We find frequent attestations of protracted lawsuits in which court decisions were overturned by a new oath with double the number of oath-helpers. If the opposing party was able to overturn an earlier oath, the first team of oathhelpers would be declared perjurers and consequently were fined, or sometimes beaten and put into prison.7 Surprisingly, in contrast to the evidence from the

3 The first surviving lay charter mentioned in a judicial process dates from 1508. See DRH 2, No. 55 (1508). 4 See, among many others, DRH B, 8, No. 113 (1578), No. 169 (1576), and No. 188 (1579). 5 Cf. GEORGESCU and SACHELARIE, Judecata domneascã în Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, 2, p. 35. 6 See, e.g. DRH B, 1, No. 221 (1490). The monks provided 24 witnesses while laymen brought 12. Cf. also BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 330. 7 DRH B, 7, No. 201 (1575).

B,

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region, or indeed from Moldavia,8 the Wallachian record seldom testifies to a reluctance to take oaths or to agreements being reached in other ways instead.9 Who could act as oath-helpers in Wallachia? We observe that the Wallachian record follows the normative precepts laid down in Roman and Byzantine legislation that a witness had to be of high social standing.10 Similarly, Werbõczy’s Tripartitum records that: “(...) the oath of a non-noble person or a peasant, being of inferior status, has no force and is not admitted as evidence for or against a noble”.11 Only the fourteenth-century Serbian laws, as recorded in Dušan’s code, indicated that witnesses should be of equal status to the party on whose behalf their evidence was given.12 In Wallachia the evidence of charters suggests that oath-helpers had to be boyars. In this respect Wallachian customary law was closer to Transylvanian than to Serbian practice. The Wallachian record indicates almost without exception that village communities involved in disputes against court officials or monastic institutions were unable to provide oath-helpers, or if they could exceptionally, that the oath-helpers provided by the villagers testified against them. The procedure was carefully observed, and the villagers were called upon to bring oath-helpers, even if there is scarcely any record of village communities succeeding in providing oath-helpers to testify on their behalf. It may be that the legitimacy of lawsuits merely depended on the procedure being followed according to the correct forms.13 Despite some protracted suits, and despite the large number of instances of perjury attested, in Wallachia oral testimony appears as the only form of legal evidence until the mid-sixteenth century and even beyond.14 To take one example, the sons of Lal and Dragomir, together with their comrades (cetaºi), entered into a dispute over the villages of ªoptani and Mãlureni with the sons of Bratei Lepºa and Micºan. After two lawsuits during the reign of Petru the 8 Cf. Y. ZAZULIAK, “‘Super tali re dubia periculosum est iuramentum’: Oath-taking and dispute procedures in fifteenth-century Galicia”, in: Medieval Legal Process: Physical, Spoken and Written Performance in the Middle Ages, ed. M. MOSTERT and P.S. BARNWELL (Turnhout, 2011: USML 22), pp. 247-267, at p. 250; RADY, Nobility, Land and Service, p. 73. 9 For one of the few instances see DRH B, 11 No. 153, in which it is mentioned that the “good people” had not allowed the oath to be taken, but had made an agreement. 10 MORRIS, “Dispute settlement in the Byzantine provinces”, p. 143. 11 Stephen Werbõczy, The Customary Law of the Renowned Kingdom of Hungary, p. 292, part. II. 33. 3-4. 12 Dushan’s Code: The Code of Serbian Tsar Stephan Dushan, p. 91, No. 147. 13 Cf. FOURACRE, “‘Placita’ and the settlement of disputes in later Merovingian Francia”, p. 36. 14 See, among many others, DRH B, 8, No. 113 (1578), No. 169 (1576), No. 188 (1579).

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Young (1559-1568), in which 12 boyars who swore an oath in favour of Lal were overridden by another team of 24 oath-takers, Lal lost the suit and his landed estates. However, he did not give up and approached Petru the Young’s successor, Prince Alexandru Mircea (1568-1577), to reclaim his and his brother’s land. After undergoing six more trials, being beaten three times, and imprisoned together with the boyars who had sworn the oath, Lal’s team managed to convince the prince of the rightfulness of his claims and regained the villages. A complex ritual of reiterated oath-taking on the Holy Gospel by the two teams of oath-helpers, witnessed by their neighbours and by ten priests, finally proved sufficient to demonstrate the justice of Lal’s demands.15 Many significant details are missing from the record. Neither in this, nor in other accounts, is spiritual punishment mentioned. However, protracted lawsuits, the overturning of former decisions, and several teams of perjurers are recorded here as in many other cases. Stahl uses Lal’s case to exemplify a system of administration of justice based more on princely whim than on juridical norms.16 The legal practice in medieval Wallachia seems peculiar to the area. Neither a general reluctance to take the oath nor institutional procedures that would prevent the reopening of cases are mentioned in the surviving evidence. Only religious sanctions are used to prevent the reopening of cases. The party who had lost the case was apparently entitled to reopen it, depending on his wishes and financial means; this was usually done after a change of prince. Only in the last decades of the sixteenth century does a fine seem to have been introduced to curtail the number of reopened cases.17 The principle of res judicata that limited the duration of these interminable Wallachian cases was introduced only with the adoption of the law code of Caragea (1817).18

Charter Evidence as an Aide-Memoire By the middle of the sixteenth century, the process of dispute settlement shows a constant interplay between oral and written procedures and a gradual replacement of oral procedures with written ones. From the reign of Mircea the 15 16 17

DRH B, 7, No. 201 (1575). STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã româneascã, p. 25. GEORGESCU and SACHELARIE, Judecata domneascã în Þara Româneascâ ºi Moldava 2,

p. 55. 18

A. RÃDULESCU, Pagini inedite din historia dreptului românesc, p. 71.

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Fig. 21 Princely summons listing oath helpers of Tismana Monastery; document formerly preserved at Tismana Monastery. Undated, c. 1561-1565. Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 704. Photo: Mariana Goina.

Shepherd (I, 1545-1552; II, 1558-59) we observe an increasing resort to the written word. From his reign written summonses sent to the defendant begin to be attested.19 Once the prince had been notified by the plaintiff, letters of summons were sent to the respondent informing him that he had to come to the princely court on a certain date and take an oath there, accompanied by oathhelpers: With God’s grace, I, prince Pãtru [...], Our Highness are writing to you, Dragomir, and to you, Cristea, from Vodiþa, and to all of your companions (cetaºi), that you have a suit with the monks of Tismana over the village of Blesniþa and the estate of Varonicu [...]. And I, Our Highness, say to you that in the very hour you see this book [charter] of Our highness, in that hour you shall come and uphold the oath with the monks in front of Our Highness, as it is the wish of the monks, and also your wish, so that you shall not deceive yourselves [...].20

19

From the seventeenth century these are called carte de soroc and carte de zi in contemporary documents. See GEORGESCU and SACHELARIE, Judecata domneascã în Þara Româneascâ ºi Moldava 2, p. 16. 20 DRH B, 5, No. 183 (before 1 June, 1560).

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The criteria for the choice of oath-helpers are unclear. There is no indication of how the selection was made other than in rhetorical references to status and age and the inevitable requirement that they be boyars. Likewise, it is not specified whether the boyars who served as witnesses in a land dispute were selected from among those who had witnessed the land conveyance, or whether they were chosen according to some other criterion.21 It is noteworthy that from the same period, besides oral testimony, charters began to be referred to in the proceedings. Written records relating to previous disputes were consulted during the decision-making process, and the outcomes of former cases were considered as reliable evidence for granting the land anew to the party that could produce such charters, even to the extent that a further round of oath-taking was not required. At first glance, many cases would appear to have been resolved on the basis of written evidence. However, it seems that while written records do gradually acquire a place in the procedure, they were seen as records of spoken testimony provided under oath. Oral testimony, and especially the pronouncing of an anathema, were singled out as constituting the legal grounds for the decision. The princes often invoked the binding force of anathema as a reason for their decisions. For instance, in 1560, Mircea the Shepherd awarded a disputed piece of land to Tismana monastery, since: (...) in early princes’ charters [as provided by the Tismana monastery], it was testified by numerous noble and aged men that those landed estates had belonged to the holy monastery. And those early princes pronounced curses in those charters with a mighty and great anathema, so that Our Highness was frightened before God to disregard them and destroy the charters of the early princes.22

Previous decisions, which had been based on oath-taking and a binding anathema, were adduced as compelling evidence. In other cases, the oral testimony of earlier deeds had to be backed up by a further round of oath-taking, and the party that was unable to provide the required number of oath-helpers lost the case. Under these circumstances, the charters provided were deemed to have been proven false by the superior testimony of the oath and were struck through by the prince.23 I would therefore argue that charters, even when used as evidence, functioned more as aids to recollection than as legal proof. Al21 22 23

Cf. RADY, Nobility, Land, and Service in medieval Hungary in Medieval Hungary, p. 213. DRH B, 5, No. 184 (1560). See, e.g. DRH B, No. 160 (1578).

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though the appearance of a new formula, “I have read the books”, suggests that charters were read or listened to by the court, the authority of ‘the books’ still rested upon the oral evidence they recorded. The order of events in a court case is a further indication of the priority given to oral testimony, since this was considered first, and it was only subsequently reinforced by recourse to written evidence.24 Charters, where they are mentioned, were invoked towards the end of the proceedings, chiefly to display the continuity of princely justice. Judges and disputants may have become accustomed by degrees to the importance of written evidence, but the older ways and the pre-eminence of oral testimony continued to prevail.25 In Wallachia, we see that the written word had little evidential value up to the last quarter of the sixteenth century, even if it had been produced in the course of litigation. Charters had to be endorsed by oral testimony, and the party unable to provide the oath-helpers lost the case, irrespective of whether they could prove written title. Princes frequently declared charters to be forgeries and untrustworthy, giving scarcely any further reasons for their decisions and merely striking through the written records and requesting oral testimony.26 No details are recorded regarding the reasons why a charter was deemed doubtful. The party unable to provide witnesses was condemned to lose the case, regardless of the fact that their land ownership was endorsed by a written title deed.27 Thus, up to the last decades of the sixteenth century title deeds were perceived as an inconclusive proof of ownership, while traditional oral testimonies were seen as more reliable and trustworthy.28

Charters as Legal Proof? Surprisingly, in the last quarter of the sixteenth century charters seem nevertheless to have acquired a foothold in judicial procedure. Some cases were decided on the basis of written evidence alone, and, in some instances, the lack of a charter could result in a case being lost. Why was this so? What prompted this change with regard to the value now being attached to the writ24

See, among many others, DRH B, 8, No. 208 (1579), No. 222 (1579). Cf. RADY, Nobility, Land, and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 74. 26 DRH B, 4, No. 209 (1547). See also DRH B, 3, No. 23 (1526), No. 50 (1528). 27 DRH B, 5, No. 36 (1554), DRH B, 4, No. 97 (1539). 28 Cf. W. DAVIES, “Charter-writing and its Uses in Early Medieval Celtic Societies’, in Literacy in Medieval Celtic Societies, ed. H. PRYCE (Cambridge, 1998), p. 102. 25

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ten record? It seems related to the wider dispute over property rights that was being fought out at this time, including the struggle of free village communities to prevent encroachment and their consequent descent into serfdom. The evidence indicates that in the last decades of the sixteenth century, in some cases, charters were the first kind of evidence to be required of a plaintiff, even, or perhaps especially, if he was of lower social status. For instance: And then, a certain man, named Dan, fell in front of Our Highness and complained that the holy monastery had seized a share of his land. And Our Highness, I have asked him, whether he has a book [charter] for this estate, and he answered that he does not have, and I gave him oral law, to bring twelve boyars, but he could not bring them and he lost the suit in front of Our Highness.29

In this case we note that the traditional ‘pecking order’ of evidence has been effectively stood on its head: oral testimony is only resorted to in the absence of written records. An illustrative case of the value ascribed to written evidence in a protracted law suit involving a village community is offered by the case of Pleniþa. Four surviving charters attest that between 1585 and 1596 the villagers of Pleniþa had at least four disputes with the high equerry, Radu, over the possession of their property: (...) and the village of Pleniþa complained before Our Highness that their village belonged to them from their ancestors. And in view of this, Our Highness, I enquired and requested from the Pleniþa villagers whether they possess books [charters] for this village, which they can show during their litigation with the abovenamed dignitaries of Our Highness. They did not have any. And they fixed a date before Our Highness [to provide the written evidence]. And when that day came, which had been fixed before Our Highness, these villagers from Pleniþa could not provide any book to show during the proceedings, neither of endowment, nor of purchase. Since I, Our Highness, saw the village had no other way, they fixed another day when they could retrieve their books so as to litigate with the abovenamed dignitaries of Our Highness. But again these villagers failed to bring books before Our Highness and the villagers from Pleniþa lost the case for the second time before Our Highness (...).30

29

DIR B,

30

DRH B,

5, No. 201(1588). 11, No. 170 (1596).

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But the villagers did not give up. Two more cases are recorded, in the course of which they received four other requests to produce the ‘books’. By contrast, the prince’s officials were able to bring an abundance of charters, which were read during the proceedings and which convinced the prince that he should hand the disputed village over to them. Nevertheless, according to the surviving record, the prince did not want to leave the villagers of Pleniþa to ‘struggle in vain’, and so he gave them the opportunity to uphold their claim through the oaths of twelve boyars. Not surprisingly, they could not bring the necessary oath-helpers. Unable to provide oral testimony as well, the villagers lost their estate. Up to this point we have tended to assume that peasants were less likely to possess written titles to their land than boyars. However, in an account of one of the subsequent retrials of the Pleniþa case the scribe rehearses what had happened during a previous court case.31 Apparently, in one of their first trials, held before Prince Petru Ear-Ring (1583-1585), the villagers had provided titles of endowment, while the boyars presented titles of inheritance.32 The scribe, however, failed to mention the charters the villagers brought to the hearing. We see a similar occurrence in the above-mentioned case of Radovanul village: the surviving records of a princely dispute make no mention of the charters belonging to Oprea and his fellow villagers, even though we still have them, preserved in a monastic cartulary. In the account of the proceedings, the written evidence provided by Coºuna monastery is mentioned, but not that of their adversaries. These scribal oversights are instructive. They confirm that the relative infrequency with which charters are mentioned as evidence brought to court does not necessarily reflect their actual use or constitute proof of their non-existence.33 Some charters surviving even to this day were not referred to in the course of litigation, even though their content touched upon the matter in dispute. To take another instance, from 1557 survives a private will made by Neacºa (a noblewoman), leaving her land to her mother and sister. In 1558, the mother commissioned a royal charter to record the private will. By 1578, however, a certain Pãcalã had made two approaches to the princely court to contest Neacºa’s will. The surviving charter that records the dispute does not mention any written will being used during the trial, despite the fact that the princely 31

DRH B,

32

DIR B,

11, No. 176 (1596). 5, No. 190 (1585). 33 Cf. M. INNES, “Archives, Documents and Landowners in Carolingian Francia”, in: Documentary Culture and the Laity, pp. 159, 180, and note 78.

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charter commissioned by Neacºa’s mother to record the testamentary donation of Neacºa is still extant. Returning to the Pleniþa case, it is surprising that the villagers were reluctant to state that their deeds had been destroyed in the past and yet were ready to promise to bring them to the next hearing. They even managed to bring one charter to the fourth appeal, but the prince declared this too to be “bad and a forgery, and not at all trustworthy”.34 It may well be that this charter was indeed a forgery, and that the outcome was influenced either by their attempt to use it, or by their inability to back it up by oral testimony. However, the fact that the villagers’ earlier records had (seemingly) no bearing on the case, whereas a decade later a trial could not be started without written proof, suggests either a sudden rush to use written records or partiality on the part of the princely court. Indeed, it appears that invalidation was a ‘common fate’ of villagers’ charters. Records of sixteenth-century lawsuits often state that villagers’ charters were destroyed in the course of trials. Rãdulescu, researching the history of old Romanian law, notes that right up to the modern period, peasants’ charters were often declared to be forgeries and were destroyed during trials held before the prince. He believes that this was done to prevent further appeals by the villagers.35 Presumably, the villagers’ ferocious protection of their title deeds, recorded in the evidence well into the modern period, and their assumption that the possession of these ‘books’ meant possession of land was a result of their struggle, often unsuccessful, to hold on to their lands. The popular saying “Ai carte ai parte” (“As long as you have a deed, you have a right”) is probably a reflection of their efforts and the related belief. The new importance that was becoming attached to written records, and the superior access that the privileged classes had to the culture of writing, might suggest that the latter were using charters as a way of reinforcing their social and political hegemony. The many cases in which peasants’ charters are reported as having been struck through suggest that the value of the written word depended upon the status of its possessor.36 We should also bear in mind that, when both parties brought written records to court, the procedure required that these records be endorsed by oral testimony. As peasants did not qualify 34

DRH B, 11, No. 266 (1597). RÃDULESCU, Pagini inedite din historia dreptului românesc, 2nd edn., ed. I. RÃDULESCUVALASOGLU (Bucharest, 1991), p. 44. 36 See, e.g. DRH B, 6, No. 190. 35

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as oath-helpers in cases involving monastic institutions or boyars, they were at a serious disadvantage in litigation and, unsurprisingly, are almost always recorded as not having been able to regain or retain their land. It seems that in Wallachia, as elsewhere in Europe, the court came to its decision on the basis of political rather than legal considerations.37 The value of written records appears to have been strongly influenced by the status of their owners. However, as a general tendency we see that conflicts over land led to a higher legal value being attributed to written records in Wallachian legal proceedings.

The Moldavian Evidence Moldavian charters issued as a result of judicial proceedings are already showing up in the record by the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1425), almost a century earlier than in Wallachia. In addition, the early disputes of which records survive were settled on behalf of laymen, and in Moldavia women as well as men are attested in trials. In the first surviving Moldavian princely charter issued as a result of a judicial process, the plaintiff was a woman, Maicolea, daughter of Stoian. Possibly she was a widow, as she is mentioned alongside her sons, Cozma and Sin, and her grandsons Balotã and Drago .38 The Moldavian evidence regarding disputes over land is thin, with only 21 charters surviving from the fifteenth century. The sixteenth-century data is rare as well: no charter produced as the result of a court hearing survives from before the reign of Alexandru Lapusneanu (1570). Only in the last quarter of the sixteenth century does the evidence become richer. The low rates of charter survival (the indirect record points to there having been protracted land suits, direct evidence of which is now lost),39 combined with certain judicial practices, may offer an explanation for the very limited number of Moldavian judicial charters produced as a result of judgments given in the princely court. A specific clause included in Moldavian charters indicates that institutional attempts were made to prevent the proliferation of lawsuits. The winners of a 37

Cf. STAHL, Traditional Romanian village communities, p. 189; STAHL, Controverse de istorie socialã româneascã, pp. 25, 28. 38 DRH A, 1, No. 42 (1418). 39 DIR A, 3, No. 22 (1573).

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case could protect themselves from retrials by leaving a sum of money (referred to as zavesca or, later on, ferie) in the princely treasury. The clause stated that “anyone who wants to reopen the case has to pay 100 golden coins (zloþi)”. This meant that potential contesters of the outcome of the trial had to pay a considerable fee before they could reopen the case. The large amount of money involved presumably prevented the protracted suits often attested in Wallachia. Like Wallachian charters, the Moldavian ones too revolve around land. Almost all were issued as a result of a hearing in the princely court. The procedure of the settlement of justice recorded in the early Moldavian charters is described in a very schematic way – if indeed it is mentioned at all. The wording reads as a simple confirmation of the ownership of an estate, and only the mentioned zavesca-clause indicates that the land is in dispute and that the charter has been issued after court proceedings.40 Similarly to those in Wallachia, presumably Moldavian titles to land were produced to confirm the estate to the victorious party rather than to describe the court proceedings. The main difference from Wallachia is that in Moldavia written evidence has a much higher legal value. Cases appear to be decided on the basis of written records alone. Even in the early, schematic charters, possession of a charter to a disputed piece of land is singled out as crucial. Clauses stating that a particular landowner obtained his land with the help of his charter appear formulaic in nature, suggesting that Moldavian laymen commonly used their deeds during the judicial process, and that their possession was adduced as the main argument for the outcome of the case.41 In 1459, for instance, Ivaºco from Sereþel brought a petition claiming that certain villages held by his nephew, Ion Negoescul, belonged to him. But Ivaºco was not able to sustain his plaint and regain the villages because, as the charter specified, “(...) Ion produced a grand charter attesting that Ivaºco had endowed him willingly with those villages and Ivaºco was not able to defend himself in any way”.42 From an early period land had to be conveyed in writing even between family members, and charters had a high legal value in court proceedings. However, a charter issued only a year later, in 1460, shows that a party to a dispute could still lose a case even if the land was endorsed in writing. We see

40 41 42

See, e.g. DRH A, 1, No. 159 (1436). DRH A, 1 No. 271 (c. 1440). DRH A, 2, No. 85 (1459).

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that Ivaºco, steward, brought a case against Toma Dumitrescul and Coste Tulbure for the villages of Sãseºti and Romîneºti in the area of Bîrlad: (...) and they litigated and litigated, and pan Ivaºco gained the two villages with the help of charters owned by his father-in-law, the court treasurer, while pan Ioan and Toma Dumitrescul together with Coste Tulbure and all his relatives lost the villages with their charters according to the entire law and justice.43

This record makes us wonder what we are not being told, and what exactly the procedure was if both contending parties possessed written title to the estate. As oral testimony was presumably involved, why is it not mentioned in the schematic record? Was oral testimony so much of a formality that it did not need to be recorded by the scribe?44 In contrast to the Wallachian evidence, in Moldavian charters the emphasis is squarely placed on the legal value of written records. Decisions can be seen to have been reached on the basis of written records, and land is assigned to those who possessed them. Could it be that oral testimony was involved only when conflicts could not be resolved by the use of written evidence? Presumably in Moldavia, as elsewhere, written records had not replaced witness testimony but coexisted with it.45 Only a few years later, in 1464, there is a case in which oral testimony is explicitly mentioned. Moreover, it is described as “the law of the country”. As in the surviving Wallachian records from after the mid-sixteenth century, this Moldavian charter indicates that, although the defendant brought a written deed to court to prove his ownership, the prince asked for oral testimony according to the “law of the country”. Only by providing it could the defendant acquire the disputed land.46 No explanation is given in the schematic record as to why a written record needed confirmation by witnesses. We have to presume that similar to Wallachia, oral testimony retained its powerful legal status. Such testimony appears to have been a decisive factor, despite the emphasis put on written records. So we see that in fifteenth century Moldavian evidence, in contrast to Wallachia, the emphasis was put on written records; land ownership was expected to be recorded in writing and charters had to be brought to

43

2, No. 97 (1460). Cf. P. WORMALD “Charters, law and the settlement of disputes in Anglo-Saxon England”, in: The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe, pp. 149-168, at pp. 153-154. 45 DRH A, 2, No. 97 (1460); Cf. also M. RADY, Nobility, Land and Service, p. 63. 46 DRH A, 2, No. 122 (1464). 44

DRH A,

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court. Yet, presumably in situations in which written evidence was lacking or conflicting, the practice was still to appeal to oral testimony. One of the most interesting and detailed examples, an apparently verbatim record of a dialogue between parties, indicates that oral testimony was a powerful legal proof in cases in which records had been lost or destroyed. The wording of the charter points once again to the high perception of written records as legal proofs. The charter reads: Boyars Crasnas and Jurja Nicolescu had a plaint based on a written record against Husin and his wife Maruºca. And Maruºca said: “We also possessed an old charter from prince Alexandru the Old, by which our father, Ion Munteanu, grandchild of Onofrei, was endowed; it was in the hands of the Russian priest, who serves in the neighbourhood of the market (mahalaua târgului) (...)”. To prove that their charter written by the hand of Bratei was entrusted for safekeeping to the priest and that it had burnt along with the church in a fire caused by a thunderstorm, the priest, along with six other priests, had to take an oath.47

The evidence of early Moldavian charters issued as a result of court proceedings suggests that written records had a high legal proof value in Moldavia from the outset. The overwhelming majority of extant charters indicate that land was held through written records: plaintiffs had to possess written records in order to bring a plaint. However, in practice oral testimony remained a powerful form of legal evidence, as some cases were clearly decided on its basis. The rhetorical emphasis on written records may have had a foreign (Hungarian) origin and have been introduced by early settlers, while local practices termed “the law of the country” relied on oral testimony. There is a lacuna of almost a century in the survival of charters produced as the result of judicial procedures at the princely court. They re-emerge into view only after the middle of the sixteenth century, and the number of recorded land disputes increases towards the end of that century. In this second body of evidence, the procedure begins to be described more fully. The data indicate that in the second half of the sixteenth century court procedures in Moldavia were more similar to those followed in Wallachia. The perception of records as an important form of legal evidence continues to be suggested by the way they are prioritised. However, more room is given to oral practices. The steps of the procedure appear more clearly. The procedure for proving the possession of land now involves both written and oral evidence. In one of the earliest original 47

DRH A,

1, No. 100 (1461).

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charters preserved from the sixteenth century (1565), prince Lãpuºneanu, after hearing the plaint of priest Onicã from Frunteºti and his relatives, fixed a day on which the defendant Gavriil Dunavãþ and his sisters could bring written as well as oral testimony to support their plant: “So that, My Highness, I have appointed them a day, in a fortnight, when they have to bring to the court their book [charter] and their law [oral testimony]”.48 We see a clearer description of the procedure. The wording of the charter continues to assign priority to written evidence: charters are asked for as proof of land possession in the first place. However, immediately afterwards oral testimony is explicitly mentioned. Why was the procedure now more clearly spelled out? Possibly, the change in the framing of the charter had been brought about by improvements in the level of scribal competence, with officials now able to record the procedure more comprehensibly. Alternatively, the menace of forged records, which increased steadily after mid-sixteenth century, may have caused a new emphasis to be put on the probatory role of oral testimony. Moreover, when charters of ownership were provided by both parties involved in a case, oral testimony was mentioned as the sole criterion for adjudicating between them: (...) And she, Lady (cneaghinea) Anghelina, ªeptilici’s daughter, and Gheanghea’s sons brought before us their charters of ownership, which they possessed from Stephen the Old, and Petru the Old, and from other earlier princes. And she, the Lady of Dumitru (cneaghinea lui Dumitru), she brought her charter of endowment issued by prince Ilie (...) And we decided according to their title deeds and sent them before aged and good people and neighbours of the estate. And they found out with their souls [meaning by oral testimony] that the daughter of Septilici and sons of Gheanghea own the estate.49

Surprisingly, from the reign of Peter the Lame, the evidence consistently suggests that, along with the greater use of charters, genuine and forged alike, new importance and emphasis were given to oral methods of proof, supposedly as a factor of extra protection. We even see that in the decision-making process the testimony of the oath-helpers was more important. Also in Moldavia, the swearing of an oath supposed a solemn ceremony. The oath would be taken on the Gospels or on the Holy Cross and involved a large gathering of people. Although court cases are most often described as having been settled on the basis of written proofs alone, and despite the fact that the written word seems 48

DRH A,

49

DIR A,

6, No. 323 (1565). vol. 4, No. 56 (1592).

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to have enjoyed a high legal status in Moldavia even in the earliest recorded disputes, the descriptions of ceremonies of oath-taking indicate that oral methods were powerful tools in the resolution of disputes. It would be far-fetched to assume that these oral procedures were a novelty. Rather, they will have gone unrecorded in the earlier charters.50 It is noteworthy that in Moldavia not only boyars who could act as oath-helpers. These helpers are described rather as neighbours, or good, aged people. The recorded emphasis on oral testimony in the last quarter of the sixteenth century makes the Moldavian dispute procedure similar to what we have seen in Wallachia. However, in contrast to the Wallachian evidence, cases are often attested as being resolved by means of common agreement, and a reluctance to take an oath is suggested.51 Perjurers are not mentioned in the Moldavian evidence, although protracted suits are attested also here. It seems that the practices followed in Moldavia were closer to those common in Hungary and Ruthenia, where oath-helpers regularly avoided taking the oath.52 To further complicate matters, some records indicate that, by the end of the sixteenth century, records were perceived in Moldavia as aide-memoires rather than as legal evidence. For instance, in the final years of the sixteenth century, the members of an extended family were embroiled in a dispute with Pobrata monastery over a piece of land. The wording of the charters suggests a great ceremony: according to the custom, the entire extended family, among them a high palatine (vornic), Gligorcea Craciunovici, as well as other high Moldavian court officials, came in person to the princely court, bringing a plaint against Pobrata monastery for possession of the village of Protopopenii. Both parties based their claims to the village on written evidence; the laymen possessed charters of endowment, while the monks held charters of exchange. No oral testimony is mentioned, and the case would appear to have been resolved on the basis of written evidence. However, when the Moldavian prince, Ieremia Movilã, assigned the land to the monastery, he gave as the most important argument in arriving at his decision the anathema recorded in the earlier monastic charters. The plaintiffs, too, the high palatine Gligorcea and his relatives, are described as being anxious about the threat of spiritual penalties as recorded in the monastic charters. They “(...) did not dare to take on themselves that anathema and gave the above-mentioned village of Protopopenii to the 50 51 52

Cf RADY, Nobility, Land, and Service in medieval Hungary, p. 63. See for instance DRH A, 7, No. 170 (1576). Cf. ZAZULIAK, “‘Super tali re dubia periculosum est iuramentum’”, pp. 251, 263.

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monks of Pobrata”.53 According to the charter recording the outcome of the dispute, the family renounced their claim to the village and handed over to the monks their charters of ownership, agreeing not to reopen the suit. In exchange, the monks of Pobrata promised to record their names in the grand monastic necrology and to remember them according to the custom. However, barely a year after the Pobrata case, we have a new charter that indicates that the boyars broke their agreement with the monastery and submitted a new plaint. The case was reopened, but the outcome was not reversed: the village remained in the possession of Pobrata monastery.54 It would appear that in Moldavia, as in Wallachia, despite the fact that settlements are mentioned as being reached on the basis of written records, these records, at least sometimes, were not perceived as binding legal proofs but rather as aids to recollection. While we have observed differences between Wallachian and Moldavian court procedure for the earlier period, the later record points rather to similarities than to differences. The evidence that fear of the religious sanctions recorded in the monastic charters caused the boyars to surrender their property seems suspicious. Perhaps we need to ask to what extent the record is a true reflection of the case.55 Why should fear of religious sanctions have initially made governor Gligorcea surrender his land if it did not prevent him from reopening the lawsuit a year later? These inconsistencies can be read as symptoms of the arbitrariness of princely justice. The prince’s invocation of the monastic anathema could have been merely a rhetorical means of justifying the arbitrariness of his decision. Other examples also suggest that in Moldavia, as in Wallachia, the process of justice was anything but consistent. Frequently, the outcome of a suit or the value of a charter depended on the status and power of its owner. Charters were often annulled during a court case, and no explanation of that decision was recorded. There are instances of Moldavian princes acknowledging that outcomes had been reached only because the jurors in previous cases had been strong and powerful. On occasion they admit that they themselves had invalidated charters in error, declaring them forgeries and as a consequence assigning the disputed land to the wrong party. For instance, we find prince Bogdan confirming a village to his servant Filip and his brothers with the admission 53

DIR A,

54

DIR A,

4, No. 201 (10 Sept. 1596). 4, No. 228 (8 June 1597). 55 Cf. P. FOURACRE, “‘Placita’ and the settlement of disputes in later Merovingian Francia”, in: The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe, pp. 23-43, at p. 23.

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that in the course of a previous case he had destroyed Filip’s title deeds, only to find out afterwards that the land did indeed belong to Filip, so that he had to issue a new record.56 Even though the threat of false records, which proliferated in this period, may have given new importance to oral testimony, it is hard to believe that a century earlier disputes had been adjudicated solely on the basis of written records, as the data suggest. Perhaps this emphasis on charters as legal proof is a reflection of the influence of a foreign (Hungarian) practice that may have dominated early Moldavian law. And we do not even know if the emphasis on written evidence was not a mere rhetorical device. Later, when the commissioners of charters became more diverse and the practice reached more deeply into Moldavian society, oral procedures found a place in the written records of plaints. An alternative explanation might be that in both medieval Romanian principalities a greater use of written records in the absence of any institutional archiving system triggered a series of difficulties connected with the materiality of documents as legal proof of ownership.57 In the records of dispute settlements, many layers of charters belonging to owners from different social groups are mentioned. Frequently, princes state that some formerly issued title deeds have proven to be erroneous due to deceptive testimony. For example, in a plea from 1576 brought by the Wallachian grand palatine against the monks of Iazer monastery, two layers of charters were brought in to prove the ownership of the two disputed villages. The court official won the case since his ownership, endorsed by title deeds and by the oaths of twelve boyars, was of an earlier date. Surprisingly, and in an apparently out-of-place admission, the Wallachian prince specifies: (...) and a book of Our Highness, which Our Highness issued on behalf of monks from Iazer, to prove their ownership of these villages, that book shall not be trusted (...) since monks from Iazer had misled Our Highness. So that, the book of Our Highness shall never be trusted.58

In Moldavia and Wallachia as elsewhere, to become valid evidence charters needed to be issued in accordance with established criteria and preserved in secure places.59 Even when the first part of this desideratum was met, the 56 57 58 59

DRH A,

6, No. 378 (1569). For more information about these issues, see Chapter 10. DRH B, 8, No. 42 (1576). Cf. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, p. 57.

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safekeeping of charters remained unreliable in both principalities throughout the medieval period. Presumably, then, to discern between false and true claims of titles to land, both state institutions and landowners began to put new emphasis on oral testimony. In this context we can turn again to Michael Clanchy, who correctly notes that, in England, “objectors to written record had a case which was as strong in substance as well as in sentiment, since numerous medieval charters were forged and the authenticity of genuine ones was difficult to prove”.60 To complicate matters further, we encounter the issues of the arbitrariness of justice and the genuineness of title deeds which are decided not according their external and internal, textual, features but simply on the basis of how powerful their owners were. ***

Neither in Wallachia nor in Moldavia were written codes of law employed in the course of court proceedings during the medieval period. The only pieces of written evidence used were land charters produced as the result of a judgment given in the princely court, along with charters of endowment and conveyances. During the early period, the legal ‘weight’ of these documents was not identical in the two principalities. In Moldavia, the early data indicate that they already enjoyed a high legal status; they were the first item to be mentioned in the procedure, and outcomes appear to have been based on their possession. By contrast, in Wallachia oral testimony is given pride of place in almost every case. Up to the second half of the sixteenth century, legal evidence in this principality meant no more than the rituals of oath-taking. Charters, when they did come into use later on, were perceived as aids to memory. It is only in the last quarter of the sixteenth century that we can see increased importance being attached to the written record. Only then, and only in certain cases, were written records required to initiate a court case. I attribute this change to an acute struggle for land in the context of far-reaching economic and social transformations. The growing numbers of land transactions were more often than before backed up by a written title. Seemingly, in Wallachia it was only the dearth of land and the scramble for landed property that gave a boost to the use of written evidence as legal proof.

60

CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 297.

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In Moldavia, despite an early and constant emphasis on the role of the written word, oral procedures began to become important after the mid-sixteenth century. Charters still seem to have been given prominence and sometimes even pre-eminence. Although the use of written records continues to be mentioned first in accounts of court proceedings, however, oral testimony appears as the most important legal factor. Thus, after the mid-sixteenth century, the procedure of the settlement of disputes appears to have been similar in Moldavia and Wallachia. Formally, both written and oral testimony was required in the judicial process. In Moldavia, written evidence was mentioned first, but it had to be supported by oral testimony. The record, however, is uneven. In both principalities, judicial decisions often appear to have been arbitrary. Although charters had a rhetorical importance, the way they were viewed during the juridical process seems to have depended on the status and power of their owners. In Wallachia in particular, it appears that the social unevenness in access to written documents was used by privileged social groups to their advantage. In both principalities, monastic institutions and high court dignitaries more often than not appear as the winners of cases and of the disputed land involved.61 Even if we bear in mind that monastic institutions were in an excellent position to safeguard their records and that, as elsewhere, they were interested in those records that attested them as the winners of lawsuits, the procedure as it appears in the record suggests partiality on the part of the princely courts. By the end of the sixteenth century, the perception of charters as legal evidence seems to have become similar in the two principalities. It seems that, although the written word had gained legal weight in Wallachia and charters had acquired a high legal value in both principalities, in practice the status and effectiveness of written proof remained uneven.

61

Cf. FOURACRE, “‘Placita’ and the settlement of disputes in lter Merovingian Francia”.

Chapter 9

The Use and Function of Land Charters beyond the Courts hether and how written records were used outside the judicial system remains largely unknown. Only in Moldavia is there scant evidence pointing to their use in the process of a land conveyance. Remarkably, this use is recorded, or hinted at, as early as the mid-fifteenth century, when few Moldavian landowners are recorded commissioning charters. In fifteenth-century Moldavia, ownership was transferred using the Roman practice of renunciatio.1 It seems that written documents were used in the process as symbolic objects. Charters were passed from the old to the new landowner during the ritual. One of the earliest extant Moldavian land-transfer charters (1459) records that the chancellor, Mikhail, bought several pieces of abandoned land from Manu a lu’ Globnicu and his sons. It describes how the charter of the estate was passed from the hands of the old owner to the new one:

W

(...) And Mikhail paid them a share of the cost of the land in advance and the rest remained to be paid only when all men shall go out and mark the boundaries of the land according to custom. They have agreed that Manu and his sons shall appoint a proper day for Mikhail when they shall go out followed by boyars and neighbours, and with their old book [charter] to give and mark the entire border to Mikhail and only then shall pan Mikhail pay the remaining part of the cost to pan Manu and his sons. And we [the prince] shall confirm his land in a solemn charter according to the custom of our country, while until then pan Mikhail can own and 1 Cf. RÃDULESCU, Pagini inedite din istoria dreptului vechi românesc, p. 71; RADY, Nobility, Land, and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 75.

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settle these lands and build mills and waterways as in his own rightful property as he had paid his own rightful money.2

Mikhail’s charter shows that the ritual of perambulation was used in Moldavia quite soon after the founding of the state.3 As the practice is recorded in Hungarian law, it may have been introduced by the Transylvanian boyars who settled Moldavia as a march of the Kingdom of Hungary. The conveyance of land involved a large-scale ceremony in which court officials, members of the family, and neighbours of the estate took part. During the ritual of perambulation charters were passed from the old to the new owner. It is not surprising that at the end of the fifteenth century a written title to land was not yet perceived as sufficient legal proof of land transfer but rather as a symbolic object. It is startling, however, that in the contemporary charters oral rituals are not mentioned even if, in practice, written records did not replace the oral ceremonies but coexisted with them. Princely diplomas, which were expected to be produced in the state chancery only after the estates had been orally transferred, presumably functioned as a record of the ceremony and of the participating witnesses. During any subsequent disputes, the witnesses whose names were recorded would be able to testify in support of the parties. Thus, in practice a constant interplay can be traced between traditional rituals and written documents, even if in the written records of the period these rituals are usually not mentioned. Many later charters mention not only the ritual of the conveyance but also the banquet provided afterwards for the witnesses.4 Charters were involved in oral ceremonies and supported by the performance of these. Most probably, as Marco Mostert has pointed out, “the charter itself was less important than the performance of memorable rituals”.5 The essential power continued to be located in the spoken word.6 The large amounts spent on oral rituals point to their significance.7 It is nevertheless noteworthy that, by the middle of the fifteenth century, the possession of charters was already taken for granted, since they were used 2

2 No. 21 (1452). G. FOTINO, “Obiceiuri la fixarea hotarelor” [Customary practices observed during the procedures of fixing land boundaries], in: Pagini din Istoria dreptului românesc, ed. Gh. CRONÞ and S. FOTINO, 2nd edn. (Bucharest, 1972), pp. 29-55, at pp. 38-39. 4 DRH B, 2, No. 42. 5 MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, p. 52. 6 A. ADAMSKA, “Founding a monastery over dinner: The case of Henryków in Silesia (c. 1222-1228)”, in: Medieval Legal Process, pp. 211-245, at p. 231. 7 See, e.g. DRH B, 7, No. 120; DRH B, 8, No. 97, No. 168. 3

DRH A,

Use and Function of Land Charters beyond the Courts

247

and mentioned in the ceremony.8 However, this should be read as atypical, given the low numbers of Moldavian charters that have survived from the period. According to the account of Mikhail’s charter, every transaction seems to have been recorded in writing twice: first in a temporary charter that recorded the initial agreement ratified in the presence of the prince, and after the land had been conveyed through the appropriate rituals and the entire sum had been paid, a second charter, presumably a princely diploma, was to be issued.9 In Mikhail’s case, this second charter has not survived and it remains doubtful if it was ever produced. Unfortunately, the 1452 charter is the only surviving pre1600 record of the oral rituals performed during a land conveyance in Moldavia. It was preserved in Poland, as scribe / chancellor Mikhail emigrated to Poland and his archive was stored there.10 However, the account is consistent with later data pointing to land conveyances being accomplished through the practice of perambulation. Moldavian records become more schematic over time and cease to mention the ritual, though it presumably continued to be performed in the course of land conveyances. Charters do continue to mention that they were passed from the old to the new owner. In the last quarter of the fifteenth century, the practice of passing charters from hand to hand in the process of a land conveyance is recorded in most surviving Moldavian charters. As the charters put it: a certain landowner “(...) came before the prince and sold her / his own true property out of her / his rightful charter”.11 More importantly, the payment was conditional upon the handing over of the charter(s): And I, Our Highness [prince ªtefan], we have paid all this money, 350 Tartar zloþi to pan ªerbici and to pan Petrea Grigorescul. And after we had paid the entire sum, Petrea Grigorescul placed in the hands of Our Highness those two charters of acquisition that they possessed from our uncles prince ªtefan and prince Petru for half of Grigoreºti village.12

By the end of the fifteenth century the payment of the full sum was recorded as being conditioned not by the accomplishment of the ritual but by the passing 8

Cf. M. MOSTERT, “Introduction”, in: Medieval Legal Process, pp. 1-10, at pp. 3-4. DRH A, 2, No. 21 (1452). 10 As Moldavian boyars often emigrated to Poland because of political instability and changes in rulership, many charters belonging to Moldavian boyars have been preserved in Poland. See, e.g. DRH A, 2, No. 124. 11 See, e.g. DRH A, 2, No. 203, No. 205, No. 206, and No. 214 (1479). 12 DRH A, 3, No. 54. 9

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from hand to hand of earlier charters. Should we assume that written records replaced rituals? As rituals continue to be mentioned even in the eighteenth century and beyond, the answer is negative. Indeed, the emphasis on the importance of written records does not square with the paucity of surviving Moldavian charters. From the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504) survive some 493 charters, an average of ten per year. It might be asked whether the oftmentioned use of records during the ceremony of land conveyance is a genuine reflection of actual practice or rather an (imported) formula rooted in a foreign culture. To what extent were the formulas of the charters consistent with real practices? That not all surviving land conveyances mention the possession of charters and their being passed from the old to the new owner suggests that the information cannot be mere rhetoric. Furthermore, when charters are missing, their absence is usually accounted for by the scribe. For instance, in a report of an exchange of landed estates between two laymen, recorded in 1442, chancellor Coste: gave his charter into the hands of Stãniga’s sons, Oancea and Ilea [no social title mentioned], while Stãniga’s sons were not able to hand over their title for their village of Buciumenii to the chancellor since they possessed a collective charter for their estates and others of their villages were recorded in the same charter.13

The transfer of title deeds along with land is recorded in other areas as well. We can find it, for instance, in early Italy.14 This suggests that the use of charters in the process of land conveyance could have been an imported practice in Moldavia. Conceivably, this use was restricted to the highest social classes, as most surviving Moldavian charters issued by the central state chancery have as their beneficiaries members of the upper nobility, court officials, and their families. Even among them the use of charters seems to have been limited during the fifteenth century. Land transactions do not always mention the exchange of written records.15 In charters attesting land exchange between several individuals, a single charter is mentioned as being issued to one of the parties. It is unclear whether the other party ever commissioned a written record. For example, in a land exchange that took place between a court official, 13

1, No. 218 (1442) and No. 254 (1445); DRH A, 2, No. 258 (1484). A. SENNIS, “Documentary practices, archives and laypeople in central Italy, mid ninth to eleventh centuries”, in Documentary Culture and the Laity in the early Middle Ages, pp. 321-335, at p. 327. 15 DRH A, 2 No. 259, No. 264. 14

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249

master of the court (clucer) Duma, and his brothers, a single charter is mentioned as being issued to Duma.16 Similarly, in the process of the partitioning of shared estates between family members, charters were issued only on behalf of certain branches.17 Only seldom do the data indicate that each branch of the patriarchal family requested a princely charter for their share of the land.18 As late as the second half of the sixteenth century, there are instances in which even monastic institutions proved their ownership without recourse to writing: (...) and I had asked the monks for their ‘small’ charter for the village of Hãsnãºenii belonging to Vãscan Gãnescul and they said that they had not possessed it but kept the village only by their word of mouth.19

Thus, exceptions are attested even in later periods, and even for monastic institutions. However, the practice of passing charters from hand to hand is not attested in princely charters alone. Later private deeds indicate that the descendants of a village priest, on selling their land, also passed their old deeds to the new owner: And I, [Rusul from Bãdeni, servant of Drãgan Ciolpan, pârcãlab (‘constable’)], I testify that I have sold to pan Macrea a part of the village of Tomeºti, the share of Pãcurar, for 35 talers and an ox and a cow and a horse, but a good one. And I have received those 35 talers but the ox and the cow I shall receive when I will hand him the old charter and commission a new one from our lord.20

To summarise, the practice of using documents in the process of a land conveyance occurred early in Moldavia. Over time, the ritual percolates downwards from the highest court officials to smaller landowners. By contrast, it is not possible to deduce from the early Wallachian information whether written records were used in land transactions, or indeed how land was in fact conveyed. The early Wallachian charters record few practical details. Early charters, commissioned by several extended families and often stored in a religious foundation, suggest a scant use of written documents by 16

DRH A,

17

DRH A,

18 19 20

3, No. 30. 3, No. 108 (1492). DRH A, 3, No. 108 (17 March 1492). DIR A, 4, No. 39 DIR A, 4, No. 244; see also DIR A, 4, No. 362 (1600).

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lay landowners.21 Only after the first quarter of the seventeenth century do laymen’s title deeds gradually begin to be mentioned in the process of land conveyance. The later Wallachian charters also mention the ritual of perambulation. A charter dating from 1667 describes how the boundaries of the village of Fruntaºu were settled. Court officials sent by the prince gathered together priests, court officials, old townspeople, and villagers old and young, and “(...) these people elected two older men and placing the clod of earth on their heads made them walk the land (...)”.22 After another century has past, we learn that the bag of earth carried on his shoulders by the landowner was complemented by a charter: “(...) and we took the book and we placed it on our breast (piept) and [we placed] earth on our shoulders and we set off around the estate”.23 ***

The richer Moldavian evidence suggests that written records were not only commissioned and stored as potential proof of ownership but that they were also used in the process of a land conveyance. From the first half of the fifteenth century onwards, they were granted a place in the oral rituals that marked the transfer of property. In Wallachia, this use can be traced only from the late seventeenth century. It must remain unknown whether here, as in Moldavia, land charters were handed over along with the land during earlier periods as well.

21 22 23

DRH B, 1, No. 250 (1494), No. 188 (1483), and No. 218 (1489). IORGA, Studii ºi documente cu privire la istoria românilor, 2, p. 26. FOTINO, “Obiceiuri la fixarea hotarelor”, p. 44.

Chapter 10

The Perception of Land Charters ntil now we have seen how a variety of social and economic changes led to a growth in the number of charters issued. Not surprisingly, the existence of a greater volume of written evidence triggered changes in their perception.1 This chapter discusses how land charters were received, understood, and used.2 What were the institutional responses to the private use of charters, and how did they influence the perception of written documents and the coming into being of a written culture? In medieval Wallachia and Moldavia, the increasingly wide-ranging use of written records as proof of possession does not appear to have been followed by any changes in the procedures to standardise their use and avoid fraud. Land titles appear to have been issued in a single copy, preserved by the beneficiaries, and up to the end of the seventeenth century no registers of charters issued are preserved.3 Seemingly, a landowner, to prove ownership of land, had to take an oath along with a team of twelve oath-helpers. As a result, he was entitled to receive a written record for a given estate. Instances of fraudulent testimony, as a consequence of which a new princely charter was issued, often surface in the evidence. For instance, in 1585, prince Mihnea II the Turk acknowledges that a charter commissioned by his predecessor on behalf of the monks of Iezer Monastery is a forgery and shall not be trusted “(...) since monks from Iezer de-

U

1

Cf. RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, pp. 62-3. Cf. INNES, “Archives, documents, and landowners in Carolingian Francia”, pp. 155, 181. 3 Cf. A. NEDKVITNE, “Administrative literacy in Scandinavia 1000-1350”, in: Literacy in Medieval and Early Modern Scandinavian Culture, ed. P. HERMANN (Odense, 2005), pp. 286305, at p. 293; For sixteenth-century practices, see, e.g. DIR A, 3, No. 409. 2

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ceived His Highness (...)”.4 More worryingly, it seems that no bureaucratic methods of annulling outdated or forged charters appear to have been established. Cancelling a charter was achieved through its physical destruction. A clause was inserted in the new charter issued afterwards for the same estate. These clauses, designed to invalidate previous records, appear in charters from the fifteenth century until well into the eighteenth century: “(...) the book [charter] belonging to Stan Poianã shall never have any claim of proof against our book [charter]”.5 After the mid-sixteenth century, we often find a multitude of competing and conflicting charters. Both Moldavian and Wallachian cases frequently record a plethora of real and alleged owners of an estate all ‘proving’ their right to it by brandishing charters issued by different princes. It seems that the state chanceries provided only the possibility of issuing written records, not the means for their institutional annulment.6 It was apparently possible to claim a piece of land by using the charters of other owners as proof of possession. Instances of claims to landed estates belonging to others and pleas based on charters that were later declared to be forgeries are often attested during the sixteenth century.7 And they continue to surface in the evidence as late as the mid-eighteenth century.8 As property transactions within families were seldom recorded in writing,9 the descendants of extended families were particularly at risk.10 Possession by one branch of the family could be challenged by another branch using old family charters. Besides written proof of possession, to establish his claim the true owner had to bring in the oral testimony of at least twelve oath-helpers. The money spent on oath-helpers (called in the evidence the ‘law’) and the banquets provided for them could amount to a huge sum.11 The replacement of

4

DIR B,

5

DRH A,

5, No. 223 (1585). 1, No. 196 (1439). 6 Cf. A. LITSCHEL, “Writing and social evidence ‘before the archives’: Revealing and concealing the written in late medieval Lüneburg”, in: Writing and the Administration of Medieval Towns, pp. 185-208, at p. 207. 7 DIR B, 5, No. 185 (1584). 8 See DRH A, 6, the notes following No. 70, at p. 124. 9 For one of the few instances, see DRH A, 6, No. 504 (1591). 10 See, e.g. DRH vol. 11, No. 177 (1596). 11 DRH B, 11, No. 391 (1600).

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lost charters also involved oral testimony and substantial fees.12 Having a charter destroyed, lost, or stolen could mean heavy costs for the owner. Consequently, on the one hand, we witness a rise in the use of written records and in their importance; on the other, we see that charters are carefully hidden and that they can be stolen or seized. For instance, a Wallachian case recorded in 1576 gives an account of an unsuccessful attempt to reclaim an estate through a judicial process held before the supreme representative of the law, the prince. Losing the case caused the peasants to seize and destroy the title deeds of their enemy: (...) Relatives of Manea Dãrtãºescu brought a plea against the descendants of palatine (vornic) ªuica. They complained that the palatine had formerly adopted Manea Dãrtãºescu as a brother of the estate and thus, through the right of pre-emption, was able to purchase Manea’s family land. The enraged relatives of Manea claimed that their right of pre-emption had been ignored. Unable to regain the family estate via legal proceedings, they took hold of people who kept the charters for the disputed estates, tortured and burnt them cruelly, and took hold of the records of the disputed estate, eleven charters for the villages, and Gypsy slaves.

The enraged plaintiffs killed the holder of the estate in dispute and seized his charters. The motives for their action remain uncertain. Possibly, the wronged parties were hoping to find among the stolen deeds those belonging to their family; Manea’s relatives may have hoped to use them as instruments for recovering their land. Alternatively, written documents were perceived as instruments used by the powerful of the day to lay their hands on their land.13 A clause inserted in a later charter states that if “Manea’s family shall bring those (former) charters to court, they shall not be trusted since they have been acquired through violence”. Here we have confirmation that pleas could be based on invalid charters. This points once again to the absence of any institutional system to get rid of out-of-date records. At the private level, however, we see a clear raise in the importance of the written word. In the last decades of the sixteenth century, the precise information recorded in writing became increasingly important. Some owners of charters corrected mistakes made in writing generations earlier. In Moldavia, the 12

A Wallachian charter of 1521 records that its commissioner paid to the prince 200 silver coins, while for the various pieces of land that he had bought, he paid 40-50 silver coins (See DRH B, 2, No. 207 (1521). 13 Cf. ADAMSKA and MOSTERT, “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 704.

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new relevance of written proofs of ownership can be illustrated by the case of a large patrimonial family that defined itself as the great-grandchildren of one Fete. We shall follow the transfer of landed property over two generations in order to highlight the turning-points at which the possession of written information became more important than the traditional manner in which the family land had been controlled up to then. The process can be traced back to a Moldavian dispute recorded in 1574.14 During the previous period, it would appear that the entire extended family had based its ownership of the family estate on a charter issued during the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504). They exercised ownership without excluding anybody, presumably basing this nonexclusionary practice on oral testimony. Only after the first quarter of the sixteenth century15 did several branches of the extended family sue one particular branch on the grounds that the name of their ancestor, a son of Fete, had been omitted from the original charter commissioned by Stephen the Great. Apparently, due to the increase in the probative value of the written document as evidence, one part of the family was now reading and acting solely upon the written evidence as opposed to the custom that had previously guided their family practices. In Wallachia the same process is recorded almost at the same time as the Moldavian developments. Large patrimonial families, presumably becoming conscious of the relevance of the information recorded in their charters, started asking for them to be amended. For instance, in 1573 a large gathering of people came before the prince to state that their old family charter, issued on behalf of their grandfather by prince Radu, son of Radu the Great, needed to be amended: (...) These above-named people came before Our highness with the complaint that not all the sons of their grandfather were recorded in the book of prince Radu, namely Radul Negrul, brother of Gârdu, Stanciu’s sons, and Tatu’s sons, brother of Bucºe, and of Cârste, and of Vîlcu, sons of Balomir. And so they brought their book before Our Highness and we added all their grandfather’s sons in the [new] book of Our Highness. And Our Highness had read the old book of prince Radu (...).16

14

3, No. 37 (1574). The charter mentions that another plea was brought before a prince Petru, presumably Petru Rareº (1527-1540); unfortunately no outcome is mentioned. 16 DRH B, 8, No. 25 (1576). 15

DIR A,

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We observe that the family charter had stayed in the family unchanged for around two generations, as “prince Radu” is presumably a reference to Radu from Afumaþi (c. 1522-1529), son of Radu the Great (1485-1507), and apparently the grandsons rather than the sons of the owner asked for the correction of their grandfather’s charter. The family had not excluded the left-out branches, as oral testimony came in to complete and correct the imperfect written records. The high value put on written records is also suggested by the efforts of landowners to keep their title deeds safe and to gain possession of all former charters for (newly) acquired estates. The state institutions assisted landowners in their efforts to avoid situations in which various layers of charters gave different owners for the same estate. Princes would send delegates to collect charters from former owners of land who had sold their estates or lost them during a trial.17 In case charters were not given up willingly, princes tried to enforce their rulings. For example, the Wallachian prince Alexandru the Bad (1592-1593) issued a writ to Tismana Monastery which entitled it “(...) to capture all people from the village of Corzi and keep them tied up until they shall surrender all their charters into the hands of the monks”.18 A surviving charter of 1573 testifies that the high value attached to a title deed, or indeed to any document related to land ownership, reached down to the village level: (...) Badea postelnic (chamberlain) brought 24 boyars to set the limits of the village of Tîmbureºti. Because of prince Pãtraºcu’s death, Badea and those boyars were unable to mark the borders. Written summonses for these 24 boyars remained in the hands of serfs from Tîmbureºti; when prince Petru [successor of prince Pãtraºcu] had endowed Ivan, chancellor (logofãt) with the village of Tîmbureºti, serfs from Tîmbureºti brought those written summonses for those 24 boyars and put them in the hands of chancellor Ivan.19

Not only did these serfs hold documents in high regard but they were capable of safeguarding them, presumably without even knowing – or because not precisely knowing – their contents. Earlier research on the history of old Romanian law has pointed to the fact that peasants “safeguarded their written records ferociously”, seeing them as essential to prove the right to their land 17 18 19

DRH B,

7, No. 250. 6, No. 54 (c.1592). DRH B, 7, No. 148 (1573). DIR B,

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and believing that once their deed was lost, they were at risk of losing the land too.20 ***

All these bits and pieces of information testify that the perception of title deeds as useful instruments to prove possession was in a process of transformation. On the one hand, we see increased weight being assigned to charters in the legal process: they are contested, corrected, or falsified, proving that written information now mattered more and that they were read or expected to be read. On the other hand, the private use of charters was not regulated by any institutional set procedures of registering and archiving them in safe places. Consequently, falsification of charters was rampant and their perception remained uneven. Even if title deeds were carefully preserved, commissioned anew when lost, or corrected when they contained errors, the lack of any institutional system for registering outgoing charters left room for falsification and led to a state of affairs in which written records continued to require support from (costly) oral testimony.

20

RÃDULESCU, Pagini inedite din istoria dreptului vechi românesc, p. 44.

Chapter 11

Uses and Functions of Letters and the Status of their Users f we ask ourselves why Wallachian and Moldavian letters began to be written, and on whose behalf,1 we notice that the earliest letters were produced at the request of, and in response to, foreign institutions’ demands, or in reaction to and imitation of their practices. As elsewhere, the use of written communication came from the margins.2 Quite early already, in the first decades of the fifteenth century, we see foreign documentary practices being adopted.

I

The Function of Letters From the first half of the fifteenth century onwards, Moldavian and Wallachian boyars used letters to deal with a variety of public responsibilities as well as for their personal needs. The functions of these various kinds of letters were manifold. The earlier they were brought into play, the more numerous and varied were their functions. A single letter could be used to convey a piece of information, to support the legitimacy of its bearer, to endorse a specific agreement, or to build and reinforce wide-ranging mechanisms of trust.

1

Cf. A. ADAMSKA, “How to study participation in medieval literacy”, oral presentation delivered at the Leeds International Medieval Congress, July 2010 (courtesy of Anna Adamska). 2 Cf. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, p. 166; ADAMSKA “‘From memory to written record’”, p. 99.

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Fig. 22 Letter of credence of prince Aldea to endorse the oral testimony of the prince’s envoy Dienish to Braºov. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 300. Photo Mariana Goina.

Letters Used as Devices of Support The medieval Wallachian and Moldavian evidence suggests that communication remained largely oral long after written documents began to be used to convey information. A letter could be written not so much to exchange information but to legitimise the oral speech of the messenger: “(...) and what he would say to your highness, you shall believe it as if we spoke mouth to mouth”.3 Those letters whose function was limited to serving as material proof of the trustworthiness of the words of the messenger, are known in the literature as ‘letters of accreditation’, or litterae credentiales.4 They replaced other symbolic objects, such as knives or swords, that were formerly used as devices of support, while communication continued to be conducted by oral means.5 The content of the Moldavian and Wallachian letters of accreditation confirms that, as elsewhere, their function was to legitimise the oral words delivered by envoys. In Wallachia, as a general rule, the recorded formulas are short: 3

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 96 (c. 1474-1476). Cf. D.E. QUELLER, “Thirteenth-century diplomatic envoys: Nuncii et procuratores”, Speculum 35 (1960), pp. 196-213, at p. 199; P. MONNET, “Pouvoir communal et communication politique dans les villes de l’Empire à la fin du moyen âge”, Francia 31 (2004), pp. 121-140; BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 266; Documente privitoare la istoria Ardealului, Moldovei ºi Þãrii-Româneºti, 1, No. 124 (24 Aug. 1552). 5 CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 263; A. NEDKVITNE, “Trusting writing in medieval Scandinavia”, in: Strategies of Writing, pp. 325-336, at p. 340. 4

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Io prince Vlad, prince and master, Our Highness bows to all Braºov pârgari, big and small, and wishes you a good health. Our Highness’ servant, Ion㺠Vlah, shall come to you and all he shall tell you, you shall trust him, since these are our true words. And may God bless you.6

In Moldavia, by contrast, the message is less stereotypical; it differs from prince to prince and is usually longer: Io Stephen voivod, by God’s grace, prince of the Moldavian lands, Our Highness writes to all Braºov citizens, our highness’s friends. Concerning the matter you had sent us through your envoys, jupân Caºpar and jupân Mihal, we well and properly were able to comprehend everything [what they had told us], and in the same fashion, we conveyed in plain words everything we wish to convey to Your Highness, explaining it, step by step, to them. And all they shall tell Your Highness, you shall fully trust him (sic) as if we ourselves had spoken with Your Highness, since we are king’s servants and servants of the Holy Crown and we all are your friends and friends of entire Christendom. And may God bless you, Amen. Written in Târgul de Jos, November 1.7

Other letters suggest that the conveying of information could use mixed forms of communication, with one piece of information being recorded in writing while another was left out, as it was meant to be delivered orally: Io Vlad prince and master, our highness writes to my good fellows, Braºov administrators (pârgari). You know well, that [former prince] Aldea has gone to the Turks not for your good, but for your trouble, to bring the Turkish army to plunder you, as they previously did. So I pray you as my own brothers, to prepare for me a hundred weapons with all their equipment, and also bows and arrows and shields, as much as you could, and give me your people to help me, as many as you have. I would like to go and throw [the Turks] out of my country, if God helps me, so that you and all the other Christians can live in peace. And what Our Highness’s servant, Cristea, shall tell you, you shall trust him, as these are my true words. And may God protect you!8

As there is no indication of the subject matter to be delivered viva voce, it remains unclear what type of information was not recorded in writing but was 6

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 36 (undated, c. 1431). Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 147 (dated by the editor 1475). 8 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 39 (undated, c. 14321433, No. 32, and No. 96 (c. 1474-6). 7

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left to be delivered orally. In other words, it is unclear whether the use of oral communication was more ‘convenient and traditional’ or whether certain information was too secret to be written down.9 As these letters of accreditation survive from politically active princes, we can assume that confidential information delivered orally was related to diplomacy. Following Jucker, I believe that orality inspired more trust and that letters contained only “what might without fear be entrusted to larger groups of people”.10 In the surviving Wallachian and Moldavian evidence, oral exchange of information supported by a written document is mentioned mostly in the letters exchanged with the administrations of Transylvanian towns. We may guess that the information left out was related to intelligence. A decision to exchange intelligence through oral communication could have been made for very practical reasons, since interception of correspondence took place and is mentioned in the evidence. To take one example, Isabella Jagiellon (regent of Hungary, 1541-1551, and of the principality of Transylvania, 1556-1559) instructed the citizens of Bistriþa “to guard the roads and to capture all letters”.11 The practice of transmitting confidential information via messengers was frequent in the region during this period, and the exchange of information viva voce was often reciprocal. Contemporary letters indicate that Habsburg and Transylvanian officials requested the delivery of information by word of mouth. For example, in a letter sent in 1552 from the Wallachian capital Târgoviºte, John Tartler, a messenger of the German emperor Ferdinand I, asked the senate of the town of Braºov to send him a messenger so that he could inform the latter about his mission at the Wallachian court. At the same time, he also conveyed his information orally via a Wallachian servant furnished with a letter attesting his trustworthiness.12 As the text of surviving letters suggests, Wallachian and Moldavian deliverers of oral information functioned in ways similar to those of the messengers or envoys (nuntii) used during the High Middle Ages in other parts of Europe.13 They were granted full authority to convey information in the prince’s name, 9

Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 263. M. JUCKER “Urban literacy and Urban Secrecy? Some New Approaches to an Old Problem”, in Urban Literacy, 1, pp. 231-241, at p. 240. 11 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 966. 12 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1173 (1568, May 23); Cf. BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 261. 13 Also called ambassadores, legati, cursores. Cf. MONNET “Pouvoir communal et communication politique”, p.122; BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 266. 10

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“taking the place of a letter and being the voices of their masters”.14 Messengers were seen as mere channels of transmission: “(...) quitquit Vestris dixerit Amicitiis ex parte nostri, fidem adhibere velitis creditivam, tamquam ab ore nostro prolatis” (“to all he will say to Your Friendship on our part, please assign the same creditable faith as if our own mouth had proffered it”), to quote from one of the first surviving letters of accredtation, issued by Stephen the Great (1457-1504) when recommending his messenger Oglindã to the citizens of Braºov. Similarly to other princes, he required that the words of his messengers be trusted, since they were his truthful utterances.15 Messengers seem to have been used as channels for the transmission not only of simple information but also for oaths and vows. Wallachian letters mention a prince’s request for truthful messengers able to witness an oath for their masters. It is expected that “(...) Batãr Iºtfan [Báthory István] shall pledge his oath before my messengers and send them back to me; and also, he shall send his men to us, so that we can vow our oath before them (...)”.16 The formulas used again suggest that emphasis was placed on the messenger and his ability to convey a message accurately and thereby generate trust. Not surprisingly, in medieval Moldavia and Wallachia messengers were recruited from among the highest court officials, often from the personnel employed in the state chanceries. For instance, the Moldavian scribe Matiaº was sent, together with palatine Giurgea, to the Polish king Alexandru,17 while the Wallachian chancellor Tatul is frequently attested as a messenger sent to the king of Hungary. He also delivered information to the Braºov town officials.18 Scribes of Latin and German letters are also often recorded among messengers. Possibly their language skills made the task easier. Or maybe these particular men may have been selected due to their trustworthiness and their proximity to the prince’s office, not dissimilar to the Wallachian and Moldavian native scribes.19

14

Cf. QUELLER, “Thirteenth-Century Diplomatic Envoys”, p. 199. Documentele lui ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 200. 16 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 121 (c. 1479). 17 See COSTÃCHESCU, Documente ªtefan, 2, No. 173. 18 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 1173 (1568, May 23); 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 332, No. 337, No. 338 (all letters are undated); Cf. BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 261. 19 For more information see chapter on scribes. 15

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All these instances confirm that neither in Wallachia nor in Moldavia the advent of written communication had replaced oral habits of communication.20 Presumably any information perceived as sensitive was conveyed via the spoken words of reliable messengers. They were recruited from the ranks of the top court officials, with princely chancery employees frequently figuring among them.

Letters as Written Confirmations of Oral Agreements From an early period, we find letters and other documents being used to give greater precision to agreements entered into – and presumably also to validate them. In Moldavia, as early as the first decades after the establishing of the state institutions, we already see this use of letters at the princely level. In one of the earliest surviving letters (1388), commissioned by prince Petru Muºat, is recorded: (...) We make it known to Your Highness, that we gave three thousand French silver coins to this true pan of Warsaw in that weight that we had began to use at Lutsk; and we have given this at Soceava. In this letter you shall find 3000 coins of French silver and for this we make this letter for three thousand, but Your Highness’s letter had been made for four thousand. So we ask Your Highness to make us another letter (list), similar to the previous one sealed by king’s seal but not for four thousand, but for three; and who shall bring us the written endorsement on three thousand, we shall give him back your letter (...). 21

The beneficiary of this letter was the king of Poland, and we may assume it was issued at his request. This instance may help us trace how the use of documents in support of oral agreements reached Moldavia. The letter was written at Suceava, in Slavonic, and described as a list (a generic term for any written documents in medieval Moldavia). Certain constituent parts of the letter suggest a Polish scribe. Costãchescu, identifying a similar scribe’s hand in a contemporary Polish document, argues that the letter was physically written by a Polish scribe.22 It therefore appears that early missives produced in Moldavia were requested and (possibly) produced by foreign individuals. The letter also 20 21 22

Cf. NEDKVITNE, The Social Consequences of Literacy in Medieval Scandinavia, p. 243. Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 164 (1388). Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, p. 606.

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suggests that Moldavian princes were used to the use of letters as sources of accurate information and record-keeping. In Wallachia, a similar use of written documents to confirm and confer precision upon agreements becomes visible during the fifteenth century. The Wallachian prince Radu the Fair (1462-1473) wrote: “(...) I send you this letter, under my seal, so that your men can move around everywhere in my country (...)”. We may assume that it was at some merchants’ written request that prince Radu was endorsing their rights in writing. Foreign documentary practices seem to have been assimilated by the Wallachian princes at quite an early date. We soon find them in their turn asking for a document confirming the rights of their subjects. In the last quarter of the fifteenth century, the Wallachian prince stipulates: “Thus, you too, give me your book under the town seal so that my people can move freely too, if they can trade at your place (...). And this book shall be sent to me in no more than 25 days (...)”.23 Unfortunately, there are no later data about what resulted from prince Radu’s request; it nevertheless testifies to the fact that the documentary habits of foreign merchants were being assimilated by the Wallachian princes. The use of written and sealed documents by the Wallachian princes in support of their private business agreements was not long in coming. Commissioning a piece of jewellery from a Braºov craftsman, the Wallachian prince Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521) refused to let the craftsman go back to Braºov with his (princely) gold coin until the Braºov town officials had provided him with a ‘book’ (a ‘receipt’) with the town seal on it to confirm the agreement. Neagoe specified that he [the prince] “shall keep it [the letter] until my merchandise shall arrive in my hand”.24 The same use of the written word as extra confirmation of an oral agreement is brought into play by Wallachian court officials, from an even earlier period: (...) Hasten to let me know through my servant, write in your book and seal it so that I shall trust you and I shall labour for your high honour and I shall inform my prince how much help he will receive from you so that his heart rejoices, and so that he will be full of goodwill toward you and toward your honour (...).25

23 24 25

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 83 (1470). Documente ºi regeste, No. 268. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 215 (c. 1433-1440).

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All this evidence, although scattered, testifies to the fact that the Wallachian political elite was familiar with the use of written documents as proof of oral transactions.26 However, the written word did not replace the earlier oral practices. Letters recording trade agreements are often enforced by vows and oaths, and by spiritual sanctions as well.27 Shared banquets and oathtaking are frequently mentioned; they are presumably offered to seal an agreement or cement a relation of friendship.28 When conflicts arose, these vows and oral agreements were invoked. To take one example, a high Moldavian court official asked for the support of a Rodna administrator. In his letter he reminded him of the food and drink they had shared, most probably a deliberate reference to their close relations.29 In Wallachia, too, these appeals to informal relations are mainly recorded in letters commissioned by boyars. Albul, presumably as the result of a disagreement, rhetorically asks the Braºov urban administration: “(...) what a man would I be, if, after giving my word and taking the oath, I would change my mind and cheat you?” He reiterates his engagements by taking another vow: “I have a God, and I have a soul, [and I vow] on the body and blood of Christ and on my soul and I shall [not] die as a Christian, that I have no bad intentions towards you”.30 We see that, as elsewhere, written documents had replaced neither oral mechanisms of conveying information nor oaths or vows. Letters were used along with oath-taking and other oral practices as additional devices of support.

Letters as Channels of Trust Building In addition, the practice of exchanging letters was presumably seen as a mechanism for building trust and mutual dependence. 31 As there was no overarching legal authority to resolve conflicts, this use of letters to create trust between parties involved in business must have been extremely important.32 26

Cf. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society, and Culture in Early Rus, p. 166 534 documente istorice slavo-romane din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, No. 459. 28 Cf. Anna ADAMSKA “Founding a Monastery over Dinner: The Case of Henrików in Silesia (c. 1222-1228)” In Medieval Legal Process: Physical, Spoken, and Written Performance in the Middle Ages, p. 223. 29 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 1012 (1559). 30 DRH D No. 201 (c. 1433-1434). 31 M. JUCKER, “Trust and mistrust in letters: Late medieval diplomacy and its communication practices”, in: Strategies of Writing, pp. 213-236, at p. 219. 32 Cf. F. BETHENCOURT and F. EGMONT, Correspondence and Cultural Exchange in Eur27

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Albul, palatine of prince Aldea (1431-1433), wrote to the Braºov town officials: From Albul jupan to my brothers, pârgari of Braºov, with a deep bow and wishes of health. And so I speak to you, I am your brother forever, whatever you shall ask of me. And make it this way so that Vlad shall always gladly come [and stay] with me. So that your man shall be always next to me and never be away; what I shall find out I will inform you of. And may God rejoice you.33

When business relations were troubled and conflicts arose, Wallachian princes and boyars appealed to the same conventional rhetoric of friendship and trust, both when exercising their public duties as court officials and in pursuit of their private business. In their letters they either remind their addressees of their own informal relations or assure them that the person on whose behalf they are writing belongs to the same group of friends, is their ‘man’, and is therefore trustworthy and deserving of special treatment: By God’s grace, Io Vlad, prince and master. Our Highness wishes good health to Our Highness’s good friends, to Braºov judeþ and pârgari. And after this, I notify Your Highness that our men, jupân Sinadin and jupân Mihnea, had complained before Our Highness about a loss they encountered in your parts and in the town of His Highness, the king [of Hungary]. So that Your Highness knows too well that we had prayed to God to give us what we have today: to be together united and to be friends. And in case someone of your men shall encounter a misapprehension, we shall settle it for him. Equally, in case our men shall encounter a mistreatment from your men, you shall make it right for them. And now, despite the loss that had incurred to our men, Sinadin and Mihnea, you refused to do them justice, so that they can receive their money back. And Your Highness knows too well what we have agreed upon. And so that, I pray you, as rightful friends of ours, do make justice for them, so that they shall not continue to suffer such a great damage, because they are my men (...). And may God bless you. I have written at Târgoviºte, October month, 30 [days].34

This letter, commissioned in 1484 by the Wallachian prince Vlad, suggests that his desire was not only to resolve a particular trade mishap that had befallen ope, 1400-1700 (Cambridge, 2007), p. 96; BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 258. 33 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 209 (c. 1431-1433). 34 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 157 (c. 1484).

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Sinadin and Mihnea but also to remind the Braºov town officials that they were bound to one another by a special relation, “together united and friends”. It is in the name of this special relationship that he expects ‘justice’ to be done to his men. This language, the recurrent appeals to informal relations and friendship, and to shared food and drink, is especially characteristic of boyars’ letters. When they encounter problems in their personal trading affairs, court officials often remind their addressees of their former services. Dragomir Udriºte, palatine of Vlad the Monk (1482-1496), when attempting to resolve a financial predicament, reminds his “friends from Braºov town administration” about his previous services: (...) Your Highnesses possibly remember how many services I, personally was keen to perform on behalf of Your Highnesses, every time you were in distress. And for this, it came about that I have sent a man to Mihai [to enquire] about my lost wealth; and you refused to do me justice, so that I can re-take what is mine; you had not allowed me to take [my wealth] neither from Mihai, nor from Chirca but send me to be tried by the Sibiu Bürgermeister. This is a fully different affair (...).

As the distressed governor continues: “Cyrstea Roshul keeps those books of mine [receipts], refuses to return them back, and even with this you did not do justice”.35 We see that this Wallachian palatine, although he uses the word ‘justice’, is actually asking for a personal favour. He is troubled and is reluctant to submit to an institutional settlement of his trade conflict, so he uses his letter to protest against a formal trial in Sibiu. He reminds the Braºov town officials about their friendship to demand a privileged solution. The same language, appealing more to personal favours than to the country’s best interests, is used in boyars’ missives written in the process of government. In their letters we see a particular keenness to emphasise their personal friendships, and only through these a consequential advantage for their country is to come about.36

35 36

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 236. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 215.

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The Status of Those Involved in the Exchange of Written Information Who belonged to the community that was capable of using written documents, and how large was it? What was the status of the commissioners of letters and, more important, of the beneficiaries of letters? What role did the beneficiary of a letter play in its production? Were letters commissioned (and paid for) at the request of injured parties, or were they produced by default as an ordinary part of the business process? We possess no data on sets of procedures that could be followed in order to resolve (trade) conflicts. The only information the sources provide (and even this is incomplete), is the status of those on whose behalf a letter was produced. During the fifteenth century in particular, the segment of society involved in letter-writing was very restricted. Letters were commissioned by princes and leading court officials almost exclusively on behalf of their peers, princes and court officials engaged in foreign trade. Whenever the status is given of a subject on whose behalf a letter is written, he belongs to the restricted circle of high court officials. Chirot believes that two types of merchants were active in Wallachia, ‘high’ merchants, who were adept in international trade, and exchange and ‘small’ traders mainly involved in local trade.37 Letters were used exclusively on behalf of merchants active in long-distance trade. Particularly during the fifteenth century, this category of merchants was limited to members of the highest Wallachian political elite. To take an example, Sarandino, a Wallachian boyar of Greek origin, is listed among the top court officials of Dan II (I 1420-1424, II 1427-1431). On behalf of this official, Vlad Dracul (1433-1446) issued two letters to demand that his money be returned.38 Another trader, Sava, is named jupan (‘boyar’) by Neagoe Basarab in a letter written almost a century later, in which he asks the traders of Braºov “(...) to do him fair justice and return his debts as they [Wallachian merchants] were taking the cattle from Turks and they in their turn require payment”.39 It appears that boyars like Sava were engaged in the international trade that linked the Ottomans with Catholic Europe. In Moldavia, the

37

CHIROT, Schimbarea socialã intr-o societate perifericã, p. 61. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 45 (c. 1433-1437) and No. 46 (c. 1433-1)437. For Sarandino, see Relaþiile ãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, p. 68. 39 Documente ºi regeste, No. 160 (1512-1521). 38

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first surviving Moldavian princely business letter was issued to resolve a trade complaint of the Moldavian treasurer (fusor monetarum) Laurencius.40 Specific descriptors such as ‘our godfather’ given by the prince also point to the high status of the beneficiaries of written communications and to their close links to the princes who commission documents on their behalf.41 Surprisingly, princely letters could be commissioned on behalf of Wallachian women too. For instance, the Wallachian prince Radu the Fair commissioned a letter to ask that the valuables of a noblewoman (jupaniþa) Preia left behind in Braºov be returned.42 Such women seem to belong to the same restricted social stratum of political elite, as Preia is recorded as being a sister of Dragomir palatine. The consistently high social status of the beneficiaries of letters points to intimate connections between the political elite and those involved in commercial activities. We can also trace a relationship between beneficiaries of princely letters and the Wallachian political elite. Especially during the fifteenth century, written communication seems to have been restricted to a very narrow segment of society. I would, however, like to add a caveat: in Wallachian and Moldavian commercial letters, the status of the subjects in whose interests the prince or other official is writing is only seldom recorded. Besides their Christian names, they are usually referred to as homines nostri, subditi nostri, or servitori nostri. For example, in 1434 Prince Ilias (1433, 1435-1442) wrote on behalf of two Moldavian subjects whom he described as “Stephanus cum Martino, homines nostri”, from whom a citizen of Braºov had taken 33 oxen without paying for them.43 In the Wallachian letters the princes also often merely give the Christian names of the subjects for whom they are writing.44 Any specification of the status of the complainant is usually limited to ‘our subject’, ‘our man’,45 or ‘faithful subject’. For instance, Vlad Dracul (1433-1446) writes about Martin: “Because of this, I let you know that, wherever he would have any wealth left behind, regardless of its amount, you shall return it to him and no hair shall be

40

Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurmuzachi, 15.1, No. 25 (15 March 1433). Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 171. 42 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 86 (c. 1464-1472). 43 Documentele moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, No. 187 (c. 1434). 44 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 14 (c. 1424-1427) and No. 72 (c. 1456-1462). 45 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 72. 41

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missing, since he is a true subject of My Highness”.46 More often than not, the Wallachian and Moldavian beneficiaries of early letters are identified only by their Christian names.47 Letters recording the physical and financial harassment of Wallachian subjects frequently mention neither the names nor the status of the individuals involved.48 They are presented as a community integrated under the general name of ‘our folks’ (liudi) or ‘our humble ones’ (siratzi), or at best ‘our merchants and humbles’ (tr’govtci i siromasi).49 However, we should not be misled by these characterisations of them as ‘humble’. To assume that people whose social status goes unrecorded belong to the lower social classes would be unwise, given the small number of surviving princely letters. And we have also data confirming that the use of the term siromakhu (‘poor subjects’) beside someone’s Christian name by no means indicates lowly social status, but was rather the rhetoric used in letters: And I tell your highness about the trouble of our humble servant Stanislav, who took a servant from Braºov to teach him a foreign language, who, without his knowledge or will, ran away and embraced the faith of Islam”.50

Stanislav’s interest in learning a foreign language and his ability to pay a language tutor would suggest he was a comfortably-off Wallachian, possibly a merchant. In the last decades of the fifteenth century, the status of those on whose behalf documents were used seems to have diversified. Members of urban communities involved in trading activities begin to show up in the surviving letters. Of course, as before, members of the political elite still frequently appear as beneficiaries of princely letters. For example, in 1524 prince Vladislav III (1523-1524) wrote on behalf of two high-status former officials, a chamberlain and a chancellor.51 Yet members of urban communities, or individual traders, can now also be found in the surviving princely letters. The trade disputes of one Radil (Rãdilã) from Dlugopole (Câmpulung) occur repeatedly in the surviving record. In 1481, Basarab the Young asked the town of Braºov to give 46

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 51. 534 documente istorice slavo-române din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, No. 460 and No. 461(undated). 48 Documente ºi regeste, No. 15 and No. 16 (c.1427-1431). 49 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 188. 50 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 190. 51 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 165. 47

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Rãdilã back certain property of which he had been unjustly dispossessed. 52 Several decades later another Wallachian prince, Radu the Great, writes to mediate in another trade conflict on behalf apparently of the same Rãdilã, who is involved in a dispute with Sasul Blaj (Blaj ‘the Saxon’) about 18,000 knives.53 Radil / Rãdilã, a Wallachian subject and an ethnic Wallachian, to judge by his name, appears to be by no means a small-time trader. So we begin to see, alongside top-level political office-holders, members of urban trading communities. Yet these men also enjoyed high social status: traders are often referred to as jupan, a mark of status bestowed only on the highest nobility.54 It would appear that commoners, too, could commission princely letters to resolve their business problems. Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521) wrote on behalf of certain Wallachian subjects whom he described as our men, Oprea and Tatu, who, according to the record, were begging and herding cattle in Transylvania and collecting together a number of sheep, half of which were confiscated by the customs guards.55

Contemporary evidence suggests that it may have been common for Wallachian subjects to graze sheep in Transylvania. The thin record brings up another person, Dumitru from Mãþãu, who was engaged in the same activity. Working as a herdsman for several Braºov masters, he collected 450 sheep, which were taken away from him on his way home.56 Complaining before Prince Vladislav, he is referred to only by his Christian name and place of origin. These people are referred to as ‘men’ alongside a mention of the work they do, which suggests that they belonged to a lower social class of clients. The fact that Dumitru is recorded as having been a refugee in Transylvania along with prince Radu Paisie implies that he left Wallachia along with an overthrown prince, and it is known that only their closest entourage followed deposed princes into exile. The information that, when imprisoned, he was able to pay a fine of 44 golden florins supports the hypothesis that he was a wealthy princely client. 52 53 54

Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 136 (1481). Relaþiile Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 185 (c. 1503-1506). Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 45, No. 46 (c. 1433-

1437). 55

534 documente istorice slavo-române din Þara Româneascã ºi Moldova, No. 260 (un-

dated). 56

Documente ºi regeste, No. 140 (1558-1559).

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The absence of precise information hampers our understanding of the status of the beneficiaries of letters. It is hard to know for certain whether the use of written communication broadened and percolated downwards to diverse social groups, or whether it remained restricted to a narrow category of princes, court officials, and urban merchant communities. All we can trace is a slight broadening in the social range of beneficiaries of letters. Until the last quarter of the fifteenth century, chiefly princes and high court officials are mentioned in the surviving letters. Later, a difference in the manner of recording the status of beneficiaries of letters points to a difference in status. Members of urban (trader) communities begin to be mentioned among beneficiaries. We cannot trace with any certainty any further extension of the range of beneficiaries of letters. ***

In summary, as far as the evidence allows us to ascertain, the status of the beneficiaries of missives was mainly restricted to the social level of their commissioners. We find a very restricted circulation of closed letters. Both their commissioners and their beneficiaries belonged to the same social segment, the political elite. Only princes and top court officials were able to exchange information in writing. Their interest in writing was twofold: public, as employees in the state administration, and private, on their own behalf, to resolve trading and business-related issues. Apart from the political elite, members of urban trader communities are among the few other recipients of letters. In this context of very limited written communication, a letter was designed to fulfil many tasks simultaneously. Besides the exchange of information, missives were used to build mechanisms of trust and to secure informal relations between distant, out-of-country parties engaged in business ventures. We see that the more restricted the use of letters, and the higher the status of their users, the more numerous the functions attributed to the letters. Business relations with foreign communities created a specific kind of ‘textual community’ in Wallachia and Moldavia of persons who understood, used, and trusted written documents.57 57

I use the expression as pinned down by Brian Stock. See B. STOCK, The Implications of Literacy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation in the 11th and 12th centuries (Princeton, 1987).

Chapter 12

Uses of Written Documents in the Process of Government Adminstrative Letters rom the first half of the fifteenth century onwards, the written word was used in the daily routine of administrative communication both in Wallachia and Moldavia. The first instances of surviving administrative letters are extant from the reign of Mikhail (1418-1420) (son of Mircea the Old) in Wallachia,1 and from the reign of Stephen I (1434-1435) in Moldavia.2 The few surviving fifteenth-century letters were produced almost exclusively on behalf of communities of foreign merchants (nine Wallachian and four Moldavian letters are extant).3 All of the surviving letters were stored in the Transylvanian town archives. Argusbly, this paucity is related to the pattern of survival, and other administrative letters may have been issued as well. The restricted category of beneficiaries suggests that written communication originated, also at local level, as a consequence of relations with

F

1 2

Relaþiile ãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 2 and No. 3 (c. 1415-1418). Documente moldoveneºti înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 190, No. 197, and No. 199

(1435). 3 See, e.g. DRH A, 1, No. 122, No. 127, and No. 141 (1435); Documente moldoveneºti din sec. XV si XVI în Arhivul Braºovului, No. 5.

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Fig. 23 One of the first Walalchian administrative letters. Dan II informs the custom post of Dâmboviþa on how to charge Braºov traders; stored in the town archives of Braºov. c. 1424. POB, Stenner, no. 5. Photo: Mariana Goina.

foreign communities more accustomed to the use of written culture.4 On the other hand, we also see an occupation-based use of the written word.5 The first administrative letters were produced at the princely level; they were sent to a variety of state institutions: regional and county administrations, local customs posts, and court officials. They address normal trade issues: the organisation of trade in Wallachia and Moldavia, taxes, trade routes and the general conditions of trade:6

4 Cf. MOSTERT and ADAMSKA, “Introduction”, in: Writing and the Administration of Medieval Towns, p. 4. 5 K. SZENDE “Towns and the written word in medieval Hungary”, in: Writing and the Administration of Medieval Towns, pp. 123-146, at p. 145. 6 Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 197 and No. 199 (1435).

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Io Mikhail, prince (voivoda) and master. Our Highness writes to the servants of Our Highness from the town of Dâmboviþa, to the custom officials from Rucãr and Turci. Our Highness commands you to stay away from the traders of Braºov, and do not fleece them, but charge them the proper custom fees. Even more, you shall be courteous with them. You shall not charge them when their cloth is cut into pieces. You shall behave properly and treat them well so that they shall not complain against you either to my father [the king of Hungary] or to myself as it happened up to now. If I hear some words from my parent because of your words, Our Highness shall utterly punish that man, who shall wrongly obstruct [Braºov traders] even slightly. And it shall not happen otherwise, according to my order. Io voivod Mikhail, prince by God’s grace.7

Prince Mikhail’s letter is a clear illustration of a reaction to foreign practices of writing. The ‘words’ he received from his ‘father’ (his suzerain, the king of Hungary, Sigismund of Luxemburg) were most probably conveyed to him in writing, and he in turn produces his own letter to his customs officials. Note the generic term ‘words’ he uses both for Sigismund’s letter and for his officials’ behaviour, something that denotes the general oral vocabulary of the letter, which may arguably point to an institutional lack of familiarity with written communication and its practices. Early administrative letters were not only issued at the request of foreign traders and stored by them in their town archives; they were also carried by traders as proof of their privileges: Prince Stephen, by God’s grace, master of the Moldavian Lands. We write to the town officials of Bacãu and Trotuº. Traders of Braºov complained that in these parts their people and traders are mistreated. For this look at our books, which we gave them for help, so that you shall take care that nobody offends them, so that they stop complaining. [Remember] we know [where we find] your head, so that we are in peace. Written at Gura Baºeului, in the year 6943 (1435), May 26.8

As far as we can infer from the surviving record, in the first half of the fifteenth century the circulation of administrative information in writing was almost exclusively carried on, in both Wallacia and Mol7 8

DRH B,

1, No. 40 (c. 1418-1420) and No. 183. Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 190.

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davia, on behalf of foreign traders. After the mid-fifteenth century, traderelated administrative letters almost disappear from Wallachia and Moldavia. In Wallachia, they resurface in after the turn of the sixteenth century. In Moldavia, administrative letters cease to be attested for almost a century. Only from the reign of Despot Vodã (1561-1563) a small number of princely letters, addressed to local institutions, survive in monastic archives. Administrative letters become more plentiful in the Moldavian evidence only in the last two decades of the sixteenth century.9 In both medieval principalities, the surviving sixteenth-century administrative letters were issued mainly on behalf of monastic institutions. Only occasionally does the evidence point to secular landowners as beneficiaries of princely written orders. It is therefore only in the sixteenth century that we see a broadening of the range of beneficiaries of administrative missives: from foreigners to local subjects, and then from monastic to secular landowners. The two issues addressed in these letters, however, remain the same: trade problems and land ownership. This is due for the most part to patterns of survival: letters regarding trade were preserved mainly in foreign archives, while documents preserved locally were stored in monastic archives and are related almost exclusively to land ownership. As these sixteenth-century letters have not benefited form special storage conditions, we may assume that the exchange of letters on behalf of local beneficiaries commenced only after the turn of the sixteenth century. The variety of recipients of the few surviving princely administrative letters (regional court officials, town officials,10 customs employees, and tax collectors11) suggests a regular exchange of information in writing between state institutions in both Wallachia and Moldavia. The common issues addressed in the surviving letters also give the impression of correspondence as a regular procedure. In a minor matter, for instance, prince Alexandru Mircea, answering a complaint from the monastery of

9

DIR A,

10

DIR B,

11

3, No. 272, No. 312, and No. 336 (1585); DIR A, 4 No. 80 (1592). 5, No. 1 and No. 435; DRH B, 7, No. 220; DRH B, 11, No. 306 DIR B, 5, No. 200 and No. 493.

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Tismana, orders one of the county administrators (vãtav) in writing “(...) to cut down some trees and open a new path (...)”.12 As already mentioned, most of the surviving administrative letters were produced at the princely level; at the local level we mainly notice the reception of missives. In Wallachia, up to the end of the sixteenth century only three letters issued outside the princely office are extant. One of the earliest belongs to a Wallachian palatine (mare vornic); it was issued on behalf of traders from Braºov. Cazan urges the customs officials not to interfere with the free circulation of traders and tells them to “stay away from Saxons so that no hair shall be missing from their head”. Other administrative letters issued by Wallachian court officials are known to us from indirect evidence. For example, an administrative letter issued by a Wallachian official, Radu from Borãºti, is mentioned in a land charter of 1511.13 The somewhat richer sixteenth-century Wallachian evidence allows us to trace how the use of administrative letters widened at the local level. At the turn of the sixteenth century, the regional palatines were addressed in writing but were still expected to report back orally. It seems that only gradually written answers came to be required. For instance, from a confirmation charter we learn that the ownership of an estate was in dispute, and that in the process of resolution an oath was taken locally, before palatine (vornic) Cârstian: (...) Boyar Cârstian vornic testified before Our Highness that twelve boyars had taken the oath before him acknowledging that those above-written people held their estate of Precenu, half of the third part, from their ancestors. So that, Our Highness allowed them to hold their estate, half of the third part, as they owned it up to now, according to the utterance of [jupan] Cârstian.14

We see that in order to issue a princely charter for a contested estate the parties were allowed to take the oath locally, before the palatine. After witnessing the oath locally, the palatine had to come to the prince’s court 12 13 14

DRH B,

7, No. 220 (c. 1575-1577). 2, No. 82 (1511); DRH B, 11, No. 108 (1595). DRH B, 1, No. 250 (15 July 1494). DRH B,

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and, in his turn, certify by word of mouth the oath previously taken before him. Another instance, recorded in 1512, confirms this procedure. The ban of Craiova was asked by the prince to witness an oath locally and come to court and testify to it.15 However, from almost the same period, Vlad the Young (1510-1512) delegated chancellor Radu from Borãºti to witness an oath locally and write back about it.16 To assume that only chancellors had access to the written word and that the ban of Wallachia lacked this would be an error: the surviving charters commissioned by the ban of Craiova are extant from the end of the fifteenth century onwards.17 Rather, it seems that the custom of the country required that a witnessed oath be confirmed through another oath. Seemingly, after the turn of the century, with the written word gaining a more secure footing, the practice was changing, presumably for practical reasons. We may conclude that up to the turn of the sixteenth century oral testimony of local officials was required procedurally to be certified by oath. A generation later, this oral oath could be replaced by a written document: Mircea the Shepherd (I 1545-1552, II 1553-1554) required the ban of Craiova to witness an oath and write him a letter: “(...) Neagoe and Niculaºi next to his twelve boyars have to testify before you that they had owned the landed estate and that the books [charters] for that estate were lost in a house”.18 Mircea the Shepherd specified: “So that, if they take the oath, Your Highness shall make a book so that Our Highness shall trust that they have taken the oath”.19 This instance confirms that during the sixteenth century the written word was perceived as a reliable, trustworthy substitute for conveying information in Wallachia. In Moldavia, the number of surviving princely administrative letters is even smaller than in Wallachia. However, as in the Wallachian evidence, they have a variety of local institutions as their addressees, and the issues addressed are relatively commonplace. For example, a princely letter asks the tax collectors of Neamþ to deal justly with Mihãilã from 15 16 17 18 19

DRH B,

2, No. 110 (1512). 2, No. 82 (1511). DRH B, 1, No. 245 (c. 1494). DRH B, 4, No. 218 (c. 1546-1551). DRH B, 4, No. 218 (c. 1546-1551). DRH B,

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Hãlãºeºti, who had complained of being incorrectly taxed; he had been taxed as a commoner and had been charged a cow, whereas he actually belonged to the knightly order.20 This princely administrative letter written on behalf of a minor boyar (neamiº) suggests that the exchange of written information between Moldavian state institutions was a common occurrence. Almost no administrative letters issued by Moldavian local institutions survive. It seems that in Moldavia, for almost all of the sixteenth century, the local level was mainly the recipient of administrative letters. Only from the end of the century there are extant missives issued by county and urban officials. The earliest is an administrative letter in Romanian by a town official of Piatra (Piatra Neamþ). In 1596, he reports to the prince about a boundary dispute between Bistriþa monastery and the village of Tãtãraºii.21 Indirect evidence about administrative letters produced locally is also extant from the last decades of the sixteenth century only. The first surviving instance testifies to different layers of officials who were able to produce documents locally and thus to communicate in writing. The information is recorded in a charter produced by a palatine, who reports a contested boundary between a monastic institution and a village community. Albu, palatine of Suceava, explains that the monks of Slatina monastery have complained before the prince that the boundaries of their village have been encroached upon. Hence, he explains, Gheorghie, constable (pârcãlab) of Suceava, “(...) had sent his missive to us, to gather good and old people from the town of Suceava and from the neighbouring places [to settle the conflict] (...)”.22 How the constable of Suceava had been informed about the complaint made by Slatina monastery is unclear. I assume that the prince may have sent a letter to his constable. This single late letter therefore suggests that three levels of court officials exchanged written information: the central princely chancery, the princely representative in the town (vornic de Suceava), and the military offi20 21 22

DIR A,

3, No. 400. Documente ºi însemnãri româneºti, No. 106 (1596). DIR A, vol. 3, No. 402 (1586).

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cial (pârcãlab) stationed in the town of Suceava. We see that the exchange of administrative information in writing seems to have become established at least by the end of the sixteenth century. Furthermore, its use was not limited to central-local interaction, as the direct evidence suggests; local court officials could issue documents in their turn to exchange information not only with the princely office but also among themselves. Although no other administrative letter apart from the charter issued by Alba, palatine (vornic) of Suceava, has survived, the characteristics of this written interaction suggest that it was a regular occurrence. The charter was presumably preserved by the monastic institution. It was interested in the final record issued by Alba, in which the procedure, witnesses, and boundaries of the disputed land were stated, rather than in the previously written requests. Time and again, we see that at least in the case of locally-issued Wallachian and Moldavian land-related evidence the thinness of the surviving record is due to poor storage; monastic documents were stored carefully according to their usefulness.23 Thus, we see that foreign traders triggered the exchange of administrative information in writing. Local beneficiaries of administrative letters become present in the evidence only after the middle of the sixteenth century. The circulation of letters was known to the various state institutions from quite an early period onwards, even if the missives of local officials seldom survive. By the mid-sixteenth century, communication based on the written word was gaining momentum in Wallachia and Moldavia. Letters could be used not only between the central and local levels of administration, but also between the various branches of the local administration. Moreover, procedures that had been exclusively oral before, now could be entrusted to writing. The written word became a medium not only for direct orders but also for testimony and vows.

23

Cf. S. KEYNES, “Royal government and the written word in late Anglo-Saxon England”, in: The Uses of Literacy in Early Medieval Europe, ed. R. MCKITTERICK (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 226-257, at p. 247.

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Writs The information recorded in some Wallachian writs suggests that written documents were used locally as well, not only for the exchange of information but also in support of information delivered orally. The first surviving writ, commissioned by Mircea the Old (1386-1418), addresses the villagers under the rule of Tismana monastery and informs them that they should obey and pay taxes only to that monastic institution.24 Its wording confirms the general definition of a writ as a “written command given by one person to another”:25 Io Mircea, grand prince and single master of the entire country of Wallachia (samodr’javnyi gospodin). Our Highness writes to all you, villages that are under the dominion of the Tismana monastery, big and small together, and so Our Highness commands you; I let you know that you shall not belong to any lord (cneaz) or boyar (boierin) of My Highness so that I might take you today and give you to somebody else tomorrow. I gave you [to Tismana monastery] for the soul of Our Highness’s parents and for my soul, so that you shall be under the order of the holy monastery of Tismana, along with all the ponds that it owns. And you shall obey them with all labour dues (slujbbah) and fees (dajdah’) including the due to serve as a guard (posada) and the lord’s tallage in buckets and baskets. And if somebody shall lie to you, you shall not trust him by any means. All labour dues and fees from the lowest to the highest that shall be collected all shall belong to Tismana monastery and monks shall collect them, and nobody else, and nobody, be they boyars, shall dare to try to levy them. And whoever among the boyars of Our Highness shall come to tax you or force you to work for them, you shall strike their heads (...).26

This princely writ was undeniably commissioned at the request of the monastery of Tismana. It was stored in its original form in the monastic archives up to the nineteenth century. The external features of the writ (an open document with attached small princely seal) indicate that it was produced to record an endowment. Should we also assume that this writ, 24

DRH B, 1, No. 33. I follow here the definition of writs taken from Michael Clanchy. See CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Word, p. 90. 26 DRH B, 1, No. 33 (undated; dated by the editors c. 1407). 25

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Fig. 24 Writ of Burtea, Grand Palatine (mare vornic), on behalf of Tismana, enabling the abbey of Tismana to keep the village of Grozeºti with his book. 27 March, c. 1558-1559, Bucharest, National Archives-C, S. I., no. 631, Photo: Mariana Goina.

as a physical object, or indeed any other document, could have been used in the process of conveying the recorded information? Some final injunctions in other contemporary princely writs suggest that the physicality of the written documents themselves might have been used in the process of communication. We may suppose that a written document was used, or was expected to be used, to back up an oral public announcement: (...) And you, Tatu from Hinþeºti, There Our Highness appointed you as overseer (vatah) so that you shall do your best to guard for us that wood and those beehives, to strive as you know best. And with this book of Our Highness you shall cry in the market so that every man shall hear that Our Highness gave that wood to the holy

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monastery, and that we have left that wood and those beehives in your charge, so that you guard them (...).27

This writ of the Wallachian prince Vlad the Monk was undoubtedly issued at the request of the monks of Glavaciok abbey. There is no specification as to whether or how the message was conveyed to the villagers; we have to assume that it was conveyed orally. The wording of the document suggests that the document itself was intended to be used to support the oral message of a court official. Presumably, the sealed princely charter was perceived as a higher authority than a mere oral statement. We may therefore assume that the charter was used as a symbol of princely power.28 We therefore see that in fourteenth century Wallachia, as earlier in Carolingian Europe, court officials conveyed their information by word of mouth, yet it was of assistance if the oral statement was endorsed by a written document.29 After the turn of the sixteenth century, injunctions were often inserted at the end of charters. This suggests that written documents continued to be used, or were expected to be used, as an extra means of reinforcing the oral message. In a early sixteenth-century princely charter, the beneficiary was entitled to display the princely document as a device supporting his claims, while the malefactor was warned to withdraw at the sight of it: “And in this way Our Highness speaks to you, that in the very instance you see Our Highness’s book [letter] you shall depart from the estate of the son of Dumitreasa”.30 Here the symbolic implication of the documents becomes clear. The power of the king is represented both by his seal and his document.31 The offender must behave as if he can see the prince himself in front of him. As Anna Adamska and Marco Mostert

27

DRH B, 1, No. 256 (1495). Cf. ADAMSKA and MOSTERT “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 708. 29 Cf. R. MCKITTERICK, The Carolingians and the Written Word (Cambridge, 1989), p. 28. Public announcements (sometime with the help of a drum) about tasks and duties to be performed by villagers are attested to have continued (in some places) as recently as the eighties of the last century. 30 DRH B, 2, No. 79 (1510-1512). 31 Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 67. 28

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have put it, “medieval letters not merely represented the sender, they were considered identical with the sender himself”.32 The available evidence also testifies that a range of other (ephemeral)33 documents were used in the process of government. They seem to have been used by a variety of court officials, including non-free tax collectors. For example, the chamberlain (postelnic) ªerban issued a letter for his Gipsy slave, Radu globnic (tax collector), to entitle him to find and bring back three runaway Gipsy women, one of whom was Radu’s daughter.34 We can see here that even slaves gradually came into contact with written documents and learned about their function and power. Yet written culture was gaining a more secure footing only at the institutional level. Outside the institutions communication remained entirely oral.35 For instance, to publicise an urgent sale of land, the owners had to announce it in three markets. In a charter of 1582, the Wallachian scribe specifies that the selling of a village by the sons of ban Hamza was “shouted in three markets, to find (purchasers) to buy the above-written estate (...)”.36 Even the offspring of a top-level Wallachian official had to follow this common practice: to reach a wider audience, some of their servants had to ‘cry’ publicly that estates were for sale. ***

We see that, from the first decades of the fifteenth century, Wallachian and Moldavian officials used written documents in the process of government as a warrant, to support and reinforce information delivered 32

Cf. ADAMSKA and MOSTERT “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 708. I follow here S. Franklin, who defines an ephemeral contingent document as one that “may accompany or facilitate a transaction but has no special status as a component of the transaction”. See FRANKLIN, Writing, Society, and Culture in Early Rus, p. 131. 34 DRH B, 6, No. 211. 35 Cf. HYDE, Literacy and its Uses, p. 218. 36 DIR B, 5, No. 57; see also DRH B, 7, No. 236 (1575) and DIR B, 5, No. 157 (1584). The same procedure was recorded once again in the charter commissioned by Gherghe, the buyer of the estate. 33

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orally. This use of documents as symbols of princely power reminds us of the early use of documents in Carolingian Europe or Anglo-Saxon England. Unlike in these cases, there are no traces of formal written regulations of administrative processes, as the use of writing was limited to the exchange of specific, contingent information. By the end of the sixteenth century, documents become a reliable medium for conveying all types of information, such as certifying speech acts like oath-taking. The new credit given to documents is yet another sign of a transition period – and of the growth of literate behaviour.37 Along the way, we can trace the interplay between the symbolic and pragmatic functions of documents.38

37 38

HYDE, Literacy and its Uses, p. 218. Cf. R. MCKITTERICK, The Carolingians and the Written Word (Cambridge, 1989), p. 26.

Chapter 13

The Documentary Culture of the Merchant Milieu s we have seen, from the early fifteenth century merchant communities were the most active commissioners of documents, with the aim of helping their business activities. The extant evidence only confirms the general picture that trade-related documents, along with many other kinds of ephemeral writing, have a low rate of survival. In this case, the normal incidence of accidental destruction was amplified by their being deliberately discarded once their usefulness had passed.1 The fragments of extant information nevertheless witness that at least some Wallachian and Moldavian merchants were well aware of the power of written documents and employed them in support of their business. The practice of using a document, a letter of safe passage, as a badge of identity seems to have been one of the earliest examples of the documentary practices among Wallachian and Moldavian merchants. During the medieval period, possession of such a letter was mandatory for travellers who had to pass through a foreign country, whether they were engaged in trading activities or not.2 Wallachian and Moldavian merchants involved in long-distance trade were also required to carry letters of safe passage. The clause requiring that documents be presented upon demand indicates that individual merchants were expected to carry these documents physically with them.3 Wallachian and Moldavian princes provided such written testimonials for their subjects already

A

1 2

BRITNELL, “Pragmatic literacy in Western Christendom”, p. 15. FAVIER, Gold and Spices: The Rise of Commerce in the Middle Ages (New York, 1998),

p. 79. 3

Documente înainte de ªtefan cel Mare, 2, No. 190.

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Fig. 25 Safe conduct issued by the Wallachian prince Alexandru I Aldea. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, Fond POB, Stenner, no. 310. Photo: Mariana Goina.

from the first half of the fifteenth century.4 Vlad Dracul (1438-1446), writing to the Braºov town authorities, requested that “whoever would come from this country [Wallachia] without our book, you shall stop him and inform Our Highness”.5 Possession of a written document to confirm a merchant’s identity was imposed on Wallachian merchants not only by foreign institutions but by their own princes as well. The Wallachian princes were presumably concerned to monitor the involvement of their subjects in the lucrative business of trade, and they used written documents as a method of controlling the process. Moldavian and Wallachian merchants, just as their foreign colleges, used many other types of trade-related documents, such as registers and various types of receipts. Some merchants have even left behind personal archives. The first indirect evidence comes from the first surviving Moldavian urban letter (1421). It mentions a commercial register kept by the merchant Hecht, a Ger4

For Moldavia, see Cãlãtori strãini despre Þãrile Române, Supplement 1, ed. ª. ANDREet al. (Bucharest, 2011), No. 19. 5 For Wallachia: Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 58.

ESCU

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Fig. 26 Trade agreement between Dumitru and Voicu. Undated. Braºov, State Archives, POB, Stenner, no. 77. Photo: Mariana Goina.

man inhabitant of the Moldavian town of Baia.6 A few personal trade registers have even survived to this day. One of them is a Wallachian trade register of 1508; it may have been kept by a prince’s trading agent, as the acquisition of goods for the prince and his court is frequently mentioned. The repeated purchase of paper and ink confirms that its author was frequently involved in writing.7 The trade receipts that survive here and there also confirm that Wallachian merchants, especially those involved in international trade, were familiar with documentary habits.8 To give an example, one of these receipts mentions Radu, son of Socol Walah. It was written by a Bistriþa notary to confirm that “his [Radu’s] father’s cattle, given to a Bistriþa citizen, Zewch Lenart, was safely 6

Akta Grodzkie ºi Ziemskie, 4 (Lemberg, 1873), pp. 108-109, quoted by PANAITESCU “Cel mai vechiu act municipal din Moldova”, pp. 184-185. 7 Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 205. 8 Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 938 (14 August 1554).

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returned”. Even though this receipt was issued at the request of the beneficiary, a Transylvanian merchant, it was endorsed by Radu’s personal seal and his (alleged) manu propria signature.9 The Christian name of the merchant, Radu, and his identification as son of Socol Walah indicate that he was a Wallachian. Iorga believes that he belonged to the Wallachian political elite and was the son-in-law of the Wallachian prince Mircea Ciobanul.10 If true, this would be further confirmation of the closed milieu of the Wallachian merchants and their relation to the political elite. Two other receipts record in writing agreements made by Dumitru and Voicu from Râmnic with some Braºov merchants regarding the sale of a large quantity of wool.11 The Christian names of the merchants, Dumitru and Voicu, locate them in the Wallachian ethnic group. The reference to the merchants not by a status marker such as jupan but by their town of residence leads me to believe that the two belong to urban merchant communities. And we may therefore assume that the exposure of merchants to documentary practices extended beyond those linked to the Wallachian political elite. Furthermore, the Slavonic language of Dumitru and Voicu’s receipts suggests that they were commissioned by these Wallachian merchants themselves. The Romanian words used in the Slavonic text point to a Wallachian scribe. Unfortunately, the scribe recorded neither his name nor any other information about himself. The external features of the two extant receipts authorised by Dumitru and Voicu suggest that they were written by two different professional scribes.12 This suggests that public notaries were available in some Wallachian towns. Some other surviving receipts had been commissioned by Bistriþa merchants and had been written by notaries of that town.13 They confirm that Wallachian merchants involved in international trade were repeatedly exposed, both at home and abroad, to documentary practices – irrespective of the poor survival rate of trade-related documents. Even fewer trade receipts survive from Moldavia. Our knowledge of Moldavian merchants and their exposure to written culture comes chiefly from indirect evidence. The Lviv account book frequently mentions the names of Moldavian merchants, such as Nicolae Brânza from the town of Siret, Thodor

9

Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 984 (2 May 1558). Acte ºi scrisori, in: Colecþia Hurzumachi, 15.1, No. 984 (2 May 1558). 11 534 Documente istorice slavo-române, No. 460, No. 461 (undated). 12 Braºov, State Archives, Collection POB, No. 471, No. 511. For the edited document, see 534 Documente istorice slavo-române, No. 460 and No. 461. 13 534 Documente istorice slavo-române, No. 460 and No. 461 (undated). 10

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Wallachus from Suceava, or Petrus Wallachus from Iaºi.14 This suggests that especially after the turn of the sixteenth century, Moldavian subjects were involved in trans-country trade relations and were presumably familiar with the use of written documents. In 1589, for example, Petrus Wallachus from Iaºi is recorded in the Lviv account book as having sued a citizen of that town.15 Another entry of the same book shows that during the period 1564-1566 a civil case came up between Sebald Aichinger and Nicoara Theklitz Vallachus (as his name is spelled in the book) from Suceava.16 Nicoara, judging by his Christian name, belonged to the Moldavian ethnic group. It appears that he lent a sum of money, 1130 Polish golden coins (florins), to Sebald Aichinger. The transaction seems to have been confirmed in writing in Suceava. As the money was not returned in due time, Nicoara threatened to appeal to the prince’s court. This apparently worked, and Nicoara received his money back. To record this he issued a receipt in Polish.17 The patchy Moldavian trade evidence and the indirect data lead us to similar conclusions: Moldavian subjects involved in trans-country trade relations were exposed to various practices that involved written documents, and they seem to have been well aware of the power of documents – and well accustomed to their use. The slightly richer Wallachian trade-related evidence gives us some more indications regarding the use and perception of these documents. For example, at the turn of the sixteenth century, the Wallachian prince Radu the Great (1495-1508) urged the Braºov urban administration to return some receipts taken from a Wallachian merchant: “(...) and that receipt you have taken from our man you shall put it back in his hand since there is no rule that Your Highness can take it from him”.18 Similarly, the palatine (vornic) of Vlad the Monk, Dragomir Udriºte, made a personal complaint to the Braºov administration that his trade receipts had been taken by force by one of their citizens, Cristea Roºul.19 That trade receipts were taken away during a conflict points to their perception as important pieces of evidence. A letter issued by the Wallachian prince Moise Vodã (1518-1520) sheds some further light on the use and per14 15 16 17 18 19

Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul, No. 30, No. 34. Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul, No. 91. Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul, No. 41 and No. 42. Relaþiile comerciale ale Þerilor noastre cu Lembergul, No. 41-42. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 185. Relaþiile Þãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul ºi cu Þara Ungureascã, No. 236.

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ception of trade-related documents. Prince Moise complained to the Braºov town officials about an injustice committed against “the small children” (“mali I nemojni”) of a deceased Wallachian merchant, Costea. The prince specified that a Braºov town official, Bergner, in order to recover debts owed by the Wallachian merchant, had taken from Costea’s children ten times the amount due, even though “they were not able to provide any receipt to prove Costea’s debts”. Besides taking the goods, Bergner “had seized all of Costea’s receipts which recorded Costea’s loans in Buda and other Hungarian and Wallachian towns and “sent his men with those receipts around and gathered all his [Costea’s] loans”.20 Records of transactions were not only written down but actually used. They seem to have been among the first items to be taken away during a conflict, which suggests that they were held in high regard. Trade receipts also seem to have been requested or were expected to be provided in the process of claiming repayment of loans. We also see that some Wallachian merchants possessed trade-related personal archives. How widespread these practices were among Wallachian merchants? Can we assume that all those involved in trade were familiar with the use of written records? There is no specific indication of Costea’s social status, but it is apparent that he was involved in largescale trading activities. Once again, the evidence suggests that it was mainly the political elite who were involved in this type of trade, and the very fact that the Wallachian prince himself wrote a letter to protect Costea’s offspring is indicative of his high social standing. ***

We clearly see a use of documentary proof by private individuals that went beyond proof of land ownership. However, our evidence is largely limited to the merchant milieu. We may assume that in Wallachia and Moldavia, as elsewhere, it was common practice to destroy records after they had outlived their usefulness. Few merchants’ accounts have survived from before 1350 from anywhere in the world.21 In Wallachia and Moldavia also, documents that can be labelled as ephemeral come to light almost exclusively in indirect evidence. 20

534 Documente istorice slavo-române, No. 315. R. BRITNELL, “Pragmatic literacy beyond Latin Christendom”, in: Pragmatic Literacy, East and West, 1200-1300, pp. 167-188, at p. 186. 21

The Documentary Culture of the Trader Milieu

293

Nonetheless, it suggests that Wallachian and Moldavia traders, at least those involved in trans-country trade, were familiar with documentary practices and were fully aware of the power of written records.

Conclusions riting reappears on the territory of medieval Wallachia and Moldavia only in the fourteenth century. In comparison with neighbouring states, we see a time lag of several centuries. The close temporal connection between the foundation of the two medieval principalities and the re-emergence of documents suggests that written culture was related to the new structure of the state organisation. Previous forms of military and political authority in the area – the Cumans, followed by the Tartars – had left no traces of written culture. The extant medieval pragmatic documents are mainly limited to land charters and letters. This type of evidence, restricted to the recording of landed property and to rudimentary forms of written communication, is characteristic of the transition from oral to written culture.1 Land charters are the earliest and richest body of evidence. Unsurprisingly, in Wallachia and Moldavia, as elsewhere, the main reason for producing and storing these early documents was to prove land ownership.2 They enable us to trace the process of the dissemination of the use of written documents within the social body. Up to the first quarter of the sixteenth century, all extant charters are issued by the princely chancery. The close connection between early surviving land charters and monastic institutions as their producers, common in many parts of Europe, can be found neither in Wallachia nor in Moldavia. Secular rather than ecclesiastical institutions appear as the earliest producers of land records. Both early monastic and urban land records, however, survive only exceptionally; this is a clear pointer to the exclusive princely right of the sigillum authenticum

W

1

Cf. J. K. HYDE, Literacy and its Uses, p. 217. Cf., e.g. FOURACRE, “‘Placita’ and the settlement of disputes in later Merovingian Francia”, p. 23. 2

Conclusions

296

(of Byzantine influence) that was practised in Wallachia and Moldavia. As in Serbia, early Poland, and Hungary, in the medieval Romanian principalities, princely charters possessed exclusive legal authority in secular courts.3 Charters issued by other institutions, whether urban, regional, or monastic, had only provisional legal value. We know of charters issued outside of the princely office, yet the odds of their being kept for future use, and thus eventually reaching us, were in favour of those authenticated by the central power. The culture of writing shares similar core features in the two principalities. This comes as no surprise, as Moldavia and Wallachia are characteristically treated in Romanian historiography as sharing similar cultural and political backgrounds. However, a perspective that focuses on pragmatic literacy can uphold this parallelism only to a certain extent. On closer examination, we note a number of variations in the dynamics of cultural literacy of the two medieval principalities. The distinctive political and social backgrounds of these two early states led to differences in the dynamics of the commissioning of early charters. Moldavia appears as a conquered province, in which new landowners originating from the kingdom of Hungary were striving to legitimise their possession of recently acquired estates in the manner they had previously been accustomed to, that is via written records. The Wallachian state was most probably the outcome of an endogenous process. Its nobility saw no reason to alter their prestate, oral, custom-based practices of landholding. As a consequence, the fifteenth-century use of land charters as proof of ownership in the two states marks a major difference between fifteenth-century Moldavia and Wallachia. In Moldavia, from the earliest period after the founding of the state, laymen appear as active commissioners of princely charters: boyars, but also noblewomen. The role of the Church is less visible: only a quarter of the surviving early charters were issued on behalf of monastic institutions. The number of surviving Moldavian princely charters (8-9 per year after the reign of Alexandru the Good (1400-1432) testifies to constant writing activity in the princely chancery and to an awareness among boyars of the usefulness of confirming their landed possessions in writing. In the same period, we note an increasing standardisation in the layout of Moldavian charters. In addition, the types of surviving early Moldavian charters indicate that they were commis3

For Poland, see ADAMSKA, “‘From memory to written record’”, p. 93; for Hungary, see RADY, Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary, p. 68; for Serbia, see BUBALO, Pragmatic Literacy in Medieval Serbia, p. 186.

Conclusions

297

sioned on a regular basis, for ordinary land endowments and conveyances, and, from the reign of Stephen the Great on, for recording the splitting up of estates previously owned by extended families. By contrast, in Wallachia the charter evidence suggests that secular landowners hardly saw the need to secure their traditionally owned landed estates in writing. Up to the mid-fifteenth century, most of the charters that have come down to us were commissioned by monastic institutions. The surviving Wallachian charters and the smaller number of attested scribes testify to less activity in the Wallachian princely office compared to that of Moldavia. Up to the last decades of the fifteenth century, a third fewer charters survive from Wallachia compared to Moldavia. And it is only after the turn of the sixteenth century that Wallachian charters become consistent in form. A modest increase in the number of charters commissioned by Wallachian boyars appears by the last decades of the fifteenth century. This is linked to the struggle for land and power between princes and boyars and to attempts by boyars to avoid customary law restrictions of defectus seminis as well as to the recurrent economic crises that punctuated the sixteenth century in Wallachia. The types of charter we find in Wallachia demonstrate that here, unlike in Moldavia, it took an exceptional situation to trigger an increase in the use of written land records by secular landowners. The move from the collective possession of land to nuclear family holdings brought to the surface the issue of customary law restrictions that prohibited Wallachian women from inheriting land. To circumvent them, boyars without male heirs used a legal fiction that allowed them to turn their daughters into ‘sons’ or ‘brothers’ and so to make them rightful inheritors of family land. These legal gender-change operations were often secured in writing in charters issued by the princes, contributing to the first slight increase in the number of Wallachian charters by the end of the fifteenth century. The distinct development of the use of land charters in Moldavia and in Wallachia continued during the eventful sixteenth century. After the reign of Vlad Þepes (1456-1462), Wallachia was subjected to stronger political and economic domination by the Ottoman Empire, while Moldavia enjoyed relative political independence for almost another century under the stable reigns of Stephen the Great and his dynasty. Ottoman control of Wallachia resulted in a significant increase in taxation, leading to an economic crisis characterised by growing levels of land mobility. We learn of people selling their land during periods of severe famine, when they were starving on the roads and selling

Conclusions

298

their children to the Turks.4 By the mid-sixteenth century we already see aggressive land encroachment and the enlargement of great estates at the expense of free village communities. The rapid boost in the number of surviving charters in Wallachia, together with their dissemination throughout the social body, suggests a growing awareness of the power of written titles as guarantees against the encroachment of land. In order to further extend their estates, Wallachian boyars contested the customary right of pre-emption with the help of another legal fiction, that of fraternal adoption. We see a new surge in Wallachian charters commissioned by high court officials to record the adoption of a new ‘brother’, often a member of a free village community, and subsequent purchases of his and his village community members’ land shares. Contestation of these adoptions in court, and conflicts over land, were not long in coming. Charters issued as a result of judicial trials proliferated in Wallachia after the mid-sixteenth century. As a direct result, by the end of the century the number of surviving Wallachian charters matches that of the surviving Moldavian ones. Different from Moldavia, in Wallachia the commissioning of title deeds spread rapidly through a range of social strata, including the free village communities. Wallachian peasants, who enjoyed more significant traditional rights than those in Moldavia, frequently applied to the prince’s court to contest the encroachment of their land. In the process, they often appear as collective and individual commissioners of princely charters; they also made use of them in judicial cases. The struggle to avoid customary restrictions in regard to women’s rights to inherit land, the encroachment of land, and territorial depredation encouraged Wallachian landowners to secure their landed property through a written record. The distinct social and political context in Wallachia led not only to a steady increase in the number of princely charters commissioned but also to their rapid social dissemination. Court officials, the territorial nobility, and free village communities all began to have their landed estates recorded in writing as a means of safeguarding them. I would argue that the use of written records in Wallachia originated not from a desire to master a higher level of culture but rather from a very real fear of territorial depredation. In Moldavia, by contrast, the sixteenth-century charter evidence is by and large consistent with that known from the previous century. Moldavian landowners continued to record their land transactions and endowments in writing as a rule, and not only in exceptional circumstances. By the mid-sixteenth century there appears a diversification of the types of charters commissioned 4

DRH B,

7, No. 129 (1573); DRH B, 8, No. 271 (1579) and No. 325 (1580).

Conclusions

299

(of endowment, of partition, and of purchase). Charter layout becomes more schematic, and we begin to see even transactions within a single family being recorded in writing. All these changes are specific to Moldavia and suggest a more developed stage in the use of written land records. The rise in taxation that followed the greater dominance of the Ottoman Empire after the second reign of Petru Rareº is less clearly recorded in the Moldavian charter evidence, and the taxes imposed on Moldavia are, as a rule, roughly half those exacted from Wallachia.5 Symptoms of the economic crisis do however surface in the evidence. The selling of landed estates for a cow and a calf, in addition to a sum of money, comes into view from time to time in Moldavia as well.6 We also see landed estates changing hands more often, and on occasion an estate is sold by many vendors to a single purchaser, most often a court official. However, the efforts of Moldavian landowners to protect their land seem feeble compared to what was happening in Wallachia. Disputes over land are less often recorded in Moldavia and we seldom see peasant communities fighting for their land at the princely court. As a consequence the increase in the number of surviving charters is less remarkable in Moldavia. In addition, it is only seldom that we see village communities or individual peasants commissioning princely charters. Up to the end of the sixteenth century, small landowners obtained their land records outside the princely chanceries. Urban offices, courts, and even ecclesiastical officials validate them. But deeds remain a rarity in both countries, the extant record not exceeding a couple of dozen. While we have noted a diversification in the types of princely charters (in Moldavia), and a spreading of their use through the social fabric (in Wallachia), the status of title deeds remains ambiguous. Regarding them not as a record but as a symbol of ownership, or as a shadow of the owner, is still encountered during the sixteenth century and beyond.7 In records of fifteenthcentury Wallachian court proceedings charters are seldom mentioned. And even when they were brought in, oral practices (oath-taking, called ‘law’ in the charter evidence) took precedence over written records. Charters served more as aide-memoires than as legal proof. Only at the end of the sixteenth century do we find Wallachian cases that point to the probative force of written records. Even then the status of the charter continued to be seen as an extension of the status of its owner: charters brought to court by free village communities 5 6 7

MURGESCU, România ºi Europa, pp. 32-33. See, e.g. DIR A, 4, No. 224 (1597). Cf. ADAMSKA and MOSTERT, “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 709.

Conclusions

300

were more often than not invalidated or disregarded in the subsequent written account of the trial.8 By contrast, in recorded Moldavian fifteenth-century legal proceedings, charters were the first item to be mentioned. They were referred to as the most important proof of land ownership, and disputes were adjudicated on the basis of their possession. Surprisingly, after the mid-sixteenth century, whereas in Wallachia we note a growing appeal to written records in judicial proceedings, the cases from Moldavia suggest a certain devaluation of charters as legal proof. Despite the earlier appearance of written records as legally valid artefacts, after the mid-sixteenth century the evidence from this principality suggests that charters had an uncertain status and that oral practices were preeminent. While charters continued to be consistently mentioned as the first (legal) proof to be taken into consideration, it appears that in practice oral testimony proved to be decisive. By the end of the sixteenth century, the Moldavian evidence suggests that in the process of dispute resolution oral procedures rather than written documents carried the greater weight. It might be argued, if we can trust the evidence, that the early legal value of charters, a feature of foreign influence, was gradually replaced by local custom, in which oral rituals prevailed. The late appearance of the relevance of charters as valid legal instruments can be linked to the lack of institutional procedures for guaranteeing their authenticity. The registering and archiving of charters in safe places, vital for establishing their value as evidence, seems not to have existed in sixteenthcentury (or even later) Wallachia or Moldavia.9 The evidence is silent regarding princely registers of outgoing charters, or regarding any non-ecclesiastical safe places designed for the storage of records. In both principalities, charters were issued in single copies which were kept by the beneficiaries, often in strange improvised spots such as hollow trees. They were even buried in the ground. Consequently, as elsewhere, the increase in the number of written land records brought about a proliferation of forged charters.10 We frequently find conflicts between the contents of different pieces of evidence when such charters are brought into court in attempts at proving ownership.

8

DRH B, 5, No. 311; Cf. ADAMSKA and MOSTERT, “The ‘violent death’ of medieval charters”, p. 702. 9 Cf. MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, pp. 56-57. 10 Cf. CLANCHY, From Memory to Written Record, p. 323.

Conclusions

301

Despite this shortcoming, the use of written records to endorse possession spread steadily and continuously. In Wallachia in particular, the dissemination of cultural literacy during the sixteenth century is remarkable. We see that, despite the very restricted use of written land records during the fifteenth century, conflicts over land led to a rapid spread of the use of land charters among a variety of social groups and strata. The evidence shows that this use extended even to free village communities and tenants. Social inequalities, the struggle to protect land, and trading activities combined to create ‘textual communities’ in Wallachia, in what was almost a literate vacuum.11 By the end of the sixteenth century, in both principalities land ownership was often understood as the possession of written records. Even serfs knew the importance of documents and strove to keep them safe. In this context, we can understand the phenomenon of literacy only by taking account of Mostert’s distinction between the various registers of literacy and his concept of semi-illiteracy.12 It is clear that village communities, despite their presumed lack of technical literacy, were literate in the sense of their knowledge of the value of written records and of their usefulness as a means to safeguard their land. If we leave land charters to one side, pragmatic literacy in medieval Moldavia and Wallachia is made up only of commercial and diplomatic treaties and letters. Treaties, although being a limited form of early evidence, have something to say about the contribution of external factors to the establishing of models for the production of practical documents. Early diplomatic treaties were produced at the request of foreign countries. They were even written by foreign scribes. That being so, we can still see them as channels through which written culture reached Wallachia and Moldavia. The textual features of early Moldavian and Wallachian treaties suggest that Polish and Hungarian influence was significant during the fourteenth century. Later on, the western influence was gradually replaced by South Slavonic. Commercial and political treaties also indicate that the written word remained embedded in an oral culture, in which rituals endorsed and reinforced agreements secured by documents. Diplomatic treaties point to yet another difference between Wallachia and Moldavia in the way literacy developed. Although the number of extant treaties signed by both countries is limited, the surviving Moldavian political treaties 11

Cf. B. STOCK, The Implications of Literacy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation in the Eleventh and Twelfth Century (Princeton, 1983). 12 MOSTERT, “Forgery and trust”, pp. 40-41.

302

Conclusions

are more numerous and cover a longer time span. The Wallachian evidence is largely restricted to the early period of the state’s existence; after the reign of Mircea the Old (1386-1418), the extant data is mainly limited to diplomatic agreements with the urban administrations of the merchant towns of Transylvania. From this perspective, the Wallachian state enjoyed a relatively short period of autonomy as a player on the regional diplomatic stage; the diminishing number of treaties highlights a weakening of its statehood, with the principality functioning increasingly as a vassal province with no independence in international relations. Letters, another large body of evidence that has reached us, bear witness to the fact that in Wallachia and Moldavia, as elsewhere, early writing was used for communication as well as for record keeping. As most extant letters were exchanged with foreign institutions, they also show the contribution of external factors to the range of written communication in Wallachia and Moldavia. Unfortunately, the pattern of survival of letters is very patchy and reflects the ebb and flow of trade and diplomatic activities in the area inconsistently only. As the social origins of the beneficiaries of most surviving letters coincides with that of their producers, not extending beyond the political elite and urban merchant communities, this type of evidence is only marginally informative about the possible dissemination of written communication across society. The exchange of letters was carried out almost exclusively at the institutional level. Only those state and urban officials who possessed a writing office were able to engage in communication through letters. Missives are written to deal with pragmatic official matters: the state’s administration, international trade activities, intelligence, or craft-related issues. But those who had writing facilities at their disposal also used them for their own practical benefit, chiefly in organising their personal business affairs. Any private exchange of letters was carried on only in extreme circumstances, and even then the surviving letters were written in institutional settings, presumably by professional scribes. Most extant letters are issued by princes and high court officials, while a more limited number are the product of the urban milieu, the town administrations representing mostly non-Romanian-speaking communities of merchants and craftsmen. The few extant Moldavian princely letters concentrate mainly on diplomatic and administrative issues. From time to time personal issues are addressed in these princely letters, such as, for instance, the request of the Moldavian prince Stephen the Great (1457-1504) to the Venetian Republic for a

Conclusions

303

medical doctor. Trade is seldom addressed in the Moldavian letters up to the reign of Alexandru Lãpuºneanu (I 1552-1561, II 1564-1568), but the trade evidence of this ruler is surprisingly rich. Lãpuºneanu carried on a busy correspondence with the town of Bistriþa concerning his own trading affairs as well as those of his subjects. Personal issues also find a place in Lãpuºneanu’s missives. From his letters we discover that he took the trouble to indulge his sick wife with fresh cherries, that both of them appreciated Transylvanian beer and thought it had medicinal properties, and that he wanted to build public baths in his capital. We also learn that it took just a day for a letter from the capital of Moldavia to reach the town of Bistriþa. Unfortunately, this epistolary evidence is exceptional for the period. The layout of the surviving Moldavian letters, the variety of the languages of record, and the many places covered by the correspondence suggest a familiarity with the exchange of information in writing at the latest from Stephen the Great’s reign (1457-1504) onwards. Apart from the princes, the urban administrations of the northern Moldavian towns were among the earliest issuers of letters. The names of the beneficiaries of the earliest urban letters suggest that up to the mid-sixteenth century written communication at the urban level had an ethnic and occupational component. The use of letters was limited to the German communities involved in trade and craft dealings with their fellow mother-tongue communities abroad. They used their native tongue as a language of record. However, the evidence from Vaslui and Bârlad demonstrates that the use of written communication was limited neither to northern Moldavian towns, nor to the German language. The urban institutions of the southern Moldavian towns also exchanged information in writing, although Slavonic seems to have been their language of choice. Here the names of the beneficiaries of letters also suggest that members of the German and Hungarian ethnic communities involved in trade were among the first users of written communication. Members of the Moldavian ethnic group surface as commissioners of urban letters only from the last decade of the sixteenth century onwards. They write in their native Romanian. This may have been triggered not only by the Protestant Reformation’s legitimation of the vernacular languages for writing purposes but also by the dynamics of the ethnic makeup of the Moldavian towns. Urban letters written in Romanian, as well as the Moldavian names of some urban officials, suggest the growth in size and importance of the ethnic Moldavian urban communities by the end of the sixteenth century. Also from the end of the sixteenth century the number of town institutions attested as produc-

Conclusions

304

ers of pragmatic letters increases. The surviving urban letters from the newly attested urban offices of such towns as Neamþ are written in the vernacular, chiefly in Romanian. We may infer a process of accreditation of the vernacular languages as ‘writable’. The personal concerns recorded in these letters suggest that the acceptance of vernaculars (Romanian, Hungarian) as languages of record facilitated the access to written communication of a broader range of ethnic and social groups. Even if the extant urban letters are few and far between, they imply a dissemination of written communication in Moldavia by the end of the sixteenth century. Wallachian letters are similar to the Moldavian ones in many respects: they are issued at the institutional level and address pragmatic issues. However, in Wallachia trade-related issues dominate the extant letters. The richest evidence survives from the fifteenth century, when Wallachia was a segment of the commercial route linking the Levant with Western Europe. During this period, it seems that Wallachian princes and high court officials took a keen interest in the lucrative business of trade. Writing was often used to smooth its progress. Most often the Wallachian princes and their officials write to resolve the grievances of those of their subjects who are involved in international commerce. The beneficiaries of the letters seem to be restricted to the political elite: princes and high court officials. Only after the turn of the sixteenth century the exchange of written communication comes to include urban merchant communities. Princes and court dignitaries also write to deal with their own trading affairs, or to order goods from abroad. Radu the Great (1495-1508), for instance, was keen to ensure that his goods enjoyed tax exemption, a favour that seems to have been granted to most princes, but he also wrote to order personal goods, including soap. Gradually, a wider group of court officials became involved in the exchange of letters. Gherghina, chamberlain of the same Radu the Great, strove to achieve tax exemption for the knives he purchased from Braºov, and to this end he sent a written request to his “brothers and friends”, the local authorities of that town.13 Exchange of intelligence was another issue that prompted much ink to flow in fifteenth-century Wallachia. No letter survives that was written in the fifteenth-century Wallachian urban offices. In the sixteenth-century record, no limitations on literacy along ethnic lines are traceable in Wallachia, in contrast to Moldavia. Wallachian urban letters were produced on behalf of the German and Wallachian communities alike. However, the social components characteristic of the earlier Mol13

Relaþiile ãrii Româneºti cu Braºovul, No. 248.

Conclusions

305

davian record continue to be discernible in the sixteenth-century Wallachian evidence: the employment of writing at the urban level is particularly set in motion by trade-related activities.14 This focus on trade confirms that, at the urban level, as at the level of the political elite, trade was a salient factor in the spread of the written word. Wallachian merchants commissioned trade-related documents, used and stored them, and appeared to have mastered a degree of technical literacy. Trade-related documents were sporadically produced outside the institutional domain as well, and Wallachian traders kept personal archives. From the first half of the fifteenth century, the exchange of information in writing extends from international communication to local communication. In both principalities, the few surviving fifteenth-century administrative letters were written exclusively on behalf of foreign traders. But after the turn of the sixteenth century, we see in Wallachia exchanges of administrative letters addressing land-related issues. In Moldavia, administrative letters disappear altogether from the evidence after the mid-fifteenth century, apparently as a consequence of the waning of the importance of the Levantine trade route. They reappear after a century of silence, but now their beneficiaries are mainly monastic institutions and their focus is on land-related issues. As sixteenthcentury administrative letters had most probably not enjoyed special storage conditions, we may assume that early administrative letters were written exclusively at the request of foreign traders. Most fifteenth-century administrative letters were produced at the central level, while the local level there mainly saw the reception of documents. Only after the mid-sixteenth century we see local institutions becoming involved in the production of administrative letters. The richer Wallachian evidence testifies to an increase in the status of the written word as a channel of communication: the requirement for oaths to be taken orally before the prince was superseded by the acceptance of written reports confirming that oath-taking procedures had been carried out locally. These developments in the use of letters tally with the increase in the status of charters and point to a growth in the appreciation of the value of a written documents after the mid-sixteenth century. The number of surviving letters is limited, with fewer than a couple of thousands having been preserved from the two principalities taken together. Nevertheless, the variety of languages of record of the surviving letters, as for instance the four different languages of the five urban letters extant from the 14 See, e.g. the evidence from Brãila in 534 documente istorice slavo-române, No. 452 and No. 453.

Conclusions

306

Wallachian town of Câmpulung, together with the quite minor issues we find recorded in writing, suggest severe losses of correspondence. The use of letters for communication and the process of the transition from oral to written ways of communication are undoubtedly related to the organisation of the state administration and to the endowment of state offices with professional scribes. We begin to see exchanges of letters from the first decades of the fifteenth century both at the princely and court official level. The contents of these letters prove that the use of writing was inspired by sheer necessity and practicality.15 Letter writing was an immediate pragmatic activity, carried out without much concern for language or style. The colloquial language and oral style of most of the letters, administrative and otherwise, confirm their practical use. But besides the exchange of written information, letters fulfilled many other purposes as well. As in Moldavia and Wallachia the written word had not replaced oral communication, letters were used to provide the accreditation of messengers and the oral information they were to convey, and also to build trust and strengthen informal ties. By the end of the sixteenth century, the production and use of pragmatic documents reached similar levels in Moldavia and Wallachia. Their use appears marginal, restricted as it remained to landowners and to the urban milieu involved in trading activities. Recording landed property remained the foremost reason for using practical documents in medieval Moldavia and Wallachia. The evidence of the charters bears witness to a steady increase in their absolute numbers and in their broad dissemination throughout society. The layout of most charters was simplified, so that they now contained only practical information. Having recourse to writing was event-prompted, occurring only as a result of contingent, personal needs. If we adopt Simon Franklin’s classification of administrative documents as either normative (law-codes or rule-lists) or contingent (documents that deal with individual events and transactions), we can see almost no normative documents surviving from the territory of the two states during the medieval period.16 We have no codes recording local legal practices, no surviving formularies, no capitularies or any other types of written instructions that would suggest that the written word was being used in the process of government for any purpose except that of the simplest forms of

15 16

Cf. NEDKVITNE, The Social Consequences of Literacy in Medieval Scandinavia, p. 367. FRANKLIN, Writing, Society, and Culture in Early Rus, p. 131.

Conclusions

307

communication.17 This brings us back to a crucial question: to what extent does this poor survival reflect an absence of the use of practical documents for purposes other than property recording and communication? It is tempting to attribute the limited range of these documents to serious losses, as, apart from monasteries, no credible sites for document storage are mentioned in the evidence. Nevertheless, the specifics of the cultural context, as well as comparisons with similar developments in other regions, confirm the existence of an early phase of cultural literacy in the first two centuries of the existence of the Moldavian and Wallachian states. Change was slow. Up to the administrative reform of the eighteenth-century Phanariot princes, few new types of pragmatic documents survive from these territories and, despite an explosion in the number of extant charters (to several hundreds per year) and their consistent dissemination, their legal value continued to fluctuate. Moreover, oral practices remained strong. Commissioning land charters continued to involve traditional oral rituals, and in the settlement of disputes they often remained the main evidence. The end of the transition from ‘nothing to something’,18 from the fourteenth century to the pattern in the use of the written documents of the sixteenth century, proved very constant. The pattern was to remain almost unchanged in its main features over the next two hundred years. Although in terms of numbers charters proliferated significantly over the ensuing centuries, the types of surviving pragmatic documents remained largely restricted to keeping records of land ownership and written communication.

17

Cf. MCKITTERICK, The Carolingians and the Written Word, p. 3. I owe the expression to Simon Franklin. See FRANKLIN, Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, p. 275. 18

Appendix: Reigns of the Wallachain and Moldavian Princes (Fourteenth to Sixteenth Centuries) Wallachia Basarab Nicolae Alexandru Vladislav I (Vlaicu) Radu I Dan I Mircea the Old Mihail I Radu Prasnaglava Dan II Alexandru Aldea

Moldavia c. 1330 1352-1364 1364-c. 1377

Laþcu

c. 1367-c. 1375

c. 1377-1385 1385-1386 1386-1418

Petru Muºat Roman I Stephen I

c. 1375-1392 1392-1394 1394-1399

1418-1420 I 1420-1422, II 14261427 I 1422-1426, II 14271431 1431-1436

Iuga Alexandru the Good Iliaº

1399-1400 1400-1432

Vlad Dracul

I 1437-1442, II 1444-

Joint reign of Stephen II and Iliaº Stephen II

Basarab II

1447 1442-1444

Roman II

I 1432-1433, II

1435-1436 1436-1442

1442-1447 I 1447, II 1447-

1448

310

Appendix: Reigns of the Wallachian and Moldavian Princes

Vladislav II

1447-1456

Vlad Þepeº

I 1448, II 1456-1462, III

Radu the Fair

Basarab the Old (Laiotã) Basarab the Young (Þepeluº) Mircea

Petru II (joint reign with Roman II) Petru II

1447

1448

1476-1477 I 1462-1473, II 14731474, III 1474, IV (14741475) I 1473, II 1474, III 1474

Alexãndrel

I 1448-1449, II

Bogdan

1452-1454, III 1455 1449-1451

I 1474, II (1478-1480), III

Petru Aron

I 1451-1452, II

(1480-1481), IV (14811482) 1480

Vlad the Monk Radu The Great

I (1481), II (1482-1495)

Mihnea the Bad Mircea III Vlad the Young Neagoe Basarab Teodosie Vlad (Dragomir) the Monk Radu from Afumaþi Vladislav III

1508-1509

1495-1508

Stephen the Great Bogdan III Stephen the Young (ªtefãniþã) Petru Rareº

1454, III 14551457 1457-1504 1504-1517 1517-1527

I (1527-1538, II

(1538-1541) 1509-1510 1510-1512 1512-1521 1521-1522 1521

I (1522), II (1522), III

(1522), IV (1522-1523) 1522

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Index

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Index