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Individual Self-guided
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General Information Romania German (Saxon) Heritage Romania’s significant German (Saxon) heritage is obvious in
Southern Transylvania, home to hundreds of well-preserved Saxon towns and
villages. Saxons came to Transylvania during the mid 1100s from the Rhine and
Moselle Rivers regions. Highly respected for their skill and talent the Saxons
succeeded in gaining administrative autonomy, almost unmatched in the entire
feudal Europe of absolute monarchies. The result of almost nine centuries of
existence of the Saxon (German) community in Southern Transylvania is a cultural
and architectural heritage, unique in Europe. Transylvania is home to hundreds
of towns and fortified churches built between the 13th and 15th centuries by
Saxons. Brasov ( Kronstadt) Rasnov ( Rosenau )Castle Bran ( Toerzburg) Castle Sighisoara ( Schaessburg) Another intriguing church in the historic center is the
Former Leper Hospital’s Church, a Gothic chapel with an outside pulpit for
lepers. Biertan ( Birthaelm) Medias ( Mediasch) Sibiu ( Hermannstadt) Sibiu (Hermanstadt), another picturesque walled city.
Destroyed by the Tartars, the Saxons rebuilt it with stronger walls to fend off
future attacks. Its Old Town is one of the largest and best preserved in
Romania. Peles Castle Considered by many one of the most beautiful castles in all
Europe, Peles Castle is a masterpiece of German new-Renaissance architecture. Bran Castle Looming ominously in the shadow of Mt. Bucegi, Castle Bran is a dark and gloomy edifice towering over a bed of stone - a gruesome though beautifully preserved fortress, straight from an Edgar Allan Poe story. Bran was a trading point during the middle ages; now it’s claimed this was the castle of Vlad Tepes, but in fact his castle lies in ruins farther west in Transylvania in the Arges Valley. Tours are availabe through the castle. In the parking area there is a market where local peasants sell handwoven sweaters and other crafts. Situated at 30 Km from Brasov, between the Bucegi and Piatra Craiului Mountains, Bran Castle is an important national monument and landmark of the Romanian tourism, due not only to the beauty of the Castle and the landscape but also to the legend of Count Dracula. The first documentary attestation of the Bran Castle is the act issued on November 19, 1377, by Ludovic I D’Anjou giving the inhabitants of Brasov the privilege to build the Citadel “on their own work and expense”... In exchange for this, the king confirmed the subordination of 13 localities to Brasov town and conferred the leadership of Bran Fortress to a lord of the castle who had also jurisdictional attributions. The permanent garrison was numerically restrained to 12-24 soldiers: archers and ballisters. Between the years 1419-1424 the Fortress returned in Sigismund’s possession. At the end of the XV-th century, the Bran Fortress was subordinated to the authority of the Szeklers Committee, responsible for the defense of the South-East of Transylvania, and since the reign of Iancu of Hunedoara, the Fortress passed under the rule of the Voivode of Transylvania. On December 1st , 1920, the Brasov Town council donated the Bran Castle to Queen Marie of Great Romania, as a symbol of gratitude for her contribution to the achievement of the “Great Union” of 1 December 1918. Between 1920-1927, the Bran Castle was restored under the guidance of the Royal Court’s architect, Carol Liman. He transformed it into a beautiful summer residence, surrounded with a park, fountains, a lake, walking alleys and halt terraces and built the “Tea House” Of Queen Marie. In 1938 Queen Marie left with will the Bran Castle to her daughter, Princess Ileana. After the expulsion of the royal family from the country in 1948, the Bran Castle became the property of the Romanian State, being abandoned and ravaged for a period. Since 1956 the Castle was opened as a museum of history and feudal art. Being in a serious degradtion, a new restoration process of the Castle starded in 1987. The repair, by and large was finished in 1993. The conclusive museistic organization will be done taking into account new criteria, result of the researchers from the last years. ROMANIA’S PAINTED MONASTERIES Located on the northern border of Romania, Bucovina, part of the old province of Moldavia, is a mountainous region whose peaks and forests of beech and pine shelter gently sloping valleys. Here, during the short period of a quarter of a century, between 1522 and 1547, a group of churches sprang up, frescoed with a liberality and magnificence unparalleled in any other country. The painting of religious murals was widely practiced throughout the Orthodox Church, for the edification of the illiterate faithful who flocked to church on feast days, but here in Romania it achieved its finest flowering. The painted monasteries are covered within and without in vivid, minutely detailed frescoes whose colors remain fresh and strong. They have been compared to Persian carpets or to jewels set in cases of green grass and flowers within their severe enclosures. That they have survived to this day, despite the passage of time, wars, invasions, and the vandalism of rival religions or ideologies, is little short of miraculous. Development of Moldavian Style In the second half of the fifteenth century, the Moldavian ruler Stephen the Great built forty-four churches – one after each of his victories over the Turks – that established the style of elegant octagonal steeples raised on a tall star-shaped base. In his time, monasteries were decorated with enameled disks and colored bricks placed around the steeple, below the cornice, and along architectural elements. There are indications that even then, masons familiar with the technique of fresco painted colored bricks on the parts of the facades that were not adorned with glazed bricks. The idea of extending the figurative interior painting to the exterior surface of the walls may have originated in this practice, although the paintings in the open galleries of many medieval Byzantine churches in Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria do already spread somewhat to the outside walls. Monasticism was always supreme in the Eastern Church. The rulers and rich families of the two Romanian Principalities, Vallachia and Moldavia, continued the tradition of erecting churches and religious buildings. They endowed the monasteries with land, forests, vineyards, orchards and villages, and would enriched them with art treasures long after their founding. About a dozen painted monasteries dating from the second quarter of the sixteenth century remain in Bucovina. The most remarkable are the monastic foundations at Humor (hoo mor), Moldoviţa (mol do vee’ tsa), Arbore (are’ bo ray) and Voroneţ (vo ro nets). Suceviţa (sue che vee’ tsa), dating from 1600, represents a late return to the style developed some seventy years earlier. The tradition of painted churches continued into the nineteenth century in other parts of Romania, although never to the same extent. The painted monasteries show the influence of the Byzantine tradition of the Byzantine artists active in Wallachia in the 14th and early 15th centuries, but increasingly the artists were indigenous. General Description Bucovina is a region of continual rain in the spring and autumn, and it is buffeted by blizzards in winter. Violent winds from the steppes have damaged the northern side of the churches over the centuries, but the outer wall frescoes are generally admirably preserved. At one time it was thought that this permanence was due to plant pigments being mixed with egg yolk, which is fatty and therefore more waterproof than water and size. Recent studies find that the rich colors are based on harmonious combinations of a few tones derived from minerals – red ocher extracted from iron oxide clays; red from lead oxide; blue from unstable copper carbonate and in Voroneţ from lapis lazuli; green from basic copper carbonate; yellow ocher from clays rich in hydrated iron oxide. These pigments were mixed with lamp-black or charcoal to counteract the drawing action of the plaster. Other substances including animal size, vinegar, egg, gall and honey have been identified. Classic fresco technique was used, about four square meters or more being painted in a day’s work. Details were added al secco, in particular on faces and in inscriptions, and gold leaf was sometimes added. The Moldavian churches differ from the cathedrals and great churches of Western Europe in having few windows, and therefore less need for buttressing except where there is a steeple. If there is any visible Gothic influence, it is only as a mere detail in the stone plinths, doorways and window frames of the buildings. Designed for small congregations, they are small and intimate. On holidays and feast days, the neighboring population would attend services, gathering outside the church within the monastery precinct. At Easter, a midnight candlelit procession wound around the church. Voronet The church of St. George at Voroneţ dates from 1488. Strong buttresses at each corner ground the church to the earth, while its wide roof and spire give it a light winged feeling. It was erected in three months and three weeks by Stephen the Great after his third defeat of the Turks in 1486, to fulfill a pledge made to a hermit, Daniel, who had encouraged him to fight. The church was built on the spot of Daniel’s wooden hermitage, and he is buried in it. Voroneţ was therefore a votive church, not a monastery, and so had only a naos and nave. The interior frescoes date from the time of Stephen’s foundation. Between 1547 and 1550 Petru Rareş had an enclosed porch added, creating side entrances, each surmounted by a Gothic window, and ordered the external frescoes painted by anonymous monks. Because of this late date, the siege of Constantinople is not pictured: the Turks had established control over central Europe, and naturally took a dim view of such flagrant propaganda. The church strikes by its blue coloration, due to the use of lapis lazuli. The paintings on the north and, to a lesser extent, the west sides of the church have suffered damage, but those on the south and west wall are beautifully preserved. The Tree of Jesse is a harmonious composition in which white scrolls and details stand out against the blue background and red-toned figures. The door is surrounded by scenes from the lives of St Nicholas and St John. The enclosed porch leaves an unbroken surface on the west for a magnificent Last Judgment, probably the greatest of all those depicted on the painted monasteries. Angels sound the bucium, the Romanian shepherds’ instrument similar to the alpenhorn, as the graves give up the dead and wild animals come bearing the limbs they have devoured. An elephant ambles along, King David is shown playing the Moldavian cobza (a kind of guitar or lute), and the Siren who seems to depict the sea rides her dolphin. In a medallion above them sits Christ in glory, while below him is the throne of judgment, adorned with the cross and bearing the Gospel and the dove that symbolizes the Holy Spirit. The hand of God below holds the scales that weighs the souls of men. Devils try to bring down one side, while angels fight them off with lances. To the right, evildoers (depicted as contemporary kings and popes, Jews, Turks, and Tatars) await divine judgment, and a river of fire bears sinners to eternal torment. At the bottom, St. Peter leads the elect, opening the doors to Paradise, identified by a light background with stylized plants, where patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (the latter two holding on their laps the souls of the righteous, depicted as swaddled infants), St. John the Baptist, and two angels attend the Virgin. On the northern wall are shown scenes from the creation of the world and the life of Adam and Eve. Monks eventually attached themselves to the foundation, but as elsewhere the monastery was dissolved after 1786. The surrounding monks’ cells disappeared, the enclosing walls were destroyed and only the church and bell tower remain. Nuns returned in 1991; they farm and have opened a painting workshop. Humor The church of the Dormition of the Virgin at Humor dates from 1530, as attested by an inscription engraved in stone near the entrance on the outer wall of the church. It was founded by the boyar Teodor Bubuiog, Chancellor of Petru Rareş, who is buried here with his wife Anastasia, and replaced an earlier church that had been destroyed. But these were insecure times when looting and fires resulted from social unrest or exterior attacks. The monastery was enclosed in defensive walls in 1641. Today only a massive tower and the belfry remain, and a wooden stockade hung with colorful local rungs for sale replaces the walls. The monastery was set on fire by the Cossacks in 1653, and in the eighteenth century, when the Austrians occupied Bucovina and suppressed the Orthodox monasteries (1786), it became a simple parish church. It was re-established as a convent in 1990. A new church with gleaming metal roof stands on a hill nearby. Baskets of decorated eggs and colorful local rugs are put on display on wooden stockade along the walk leading up to the belfry gate. The church, topped by a cross-shaped shingled roof, is steepleless, indicating that it was not built by a ruling prince. The tall walls therefore did not need buttresses and offer a plain surface for the frescoes, which date from 1535. They have suffered great losses, although the south side is relatively well preserved. The dominant colors are dark red, blue, and green. The Virgin’s Council besides the Gothic window is particularly beautiful. More damaged is the Siege of Constantinople that covers the lower part of the wall below it. Both form part of the “Hymn to the Virgin,” after a poem dedicated to her in thanksgiving for her intervention in saving the city of Constantinople from a Persian attack in A.D. 626. In a wonderful political spin, considering the Ottoman threat to Moldavia, the Siege depicts the enemy as turbaned Turks rather than Persians. Unusually, Toma of Suceava, the master painter here, has signed a self-portrait that depicts him as a Moldavian horseman attacking a Turk. Tall arches, probably adopted from Wallachian models, open the porch to the outside and daylight. Within it the Last Judgment covers the entire surface of the west wall with its river of fire and its depiction of the sea giving up its dead to judgment – obscurely symbolized by a woman mounted on a dolphin, holding a ship. The Tree of Jesse has been moved from its traditional place on the south wall to the north face. The splendid interior frescoes, cleaned some twenty years ago under an UNESCO project, include two donor portraits: Teodor Bubuiog, the founder, and his wife appear in the Burial Chamber, and Petru Rareş with his second wife in the nave. Suceviţa High walls and heavily buttressed defensive towers surround the great monastic complex of Suceviţa, giving it the appearance of a fortress. It was founded in 1581 by Gheorghe Movilă, Bishop of Rădăuţi. His brother Ieremia, ruling prince of Moldavia, added defenses and two porches with oriental pointed arches on either side of the church. An elegant steeple resting on a star-shaped base tops the church. Massive eaves protect the outside frescoes, painted by local artists Sofronie and Ion probably in 1601. The iconography essentially repeats established models. Here, however, the visitor entering through the fortified gateway in the north wall is first confronted with an unusual and magnificent depiction of the Ladder to Paradise. Red-winged angels in orderly rows attend the righteous on a slanting ladder to the heavens, each rung inscribed with one of the monastic virtues. Sinners fall through the rungs and are driven by grinning dark devils to the chaos of hell. The scene is surmounted by the story of creation in a series of scenes with a light background. The three apses that form a trefoil at the eastern end show the usual procession of saints on a predominantly green and blue background. The figures are arranged in rows according to their significance: angels and seraphim appear at the top, archangels and prophets beneath them, then holy men (including hermits dressed only in their own hair, which has grown all over them like a shaggy fleece), martyrs, and finally military saints and ancient philosophers. On the south side, foliage entwines the rows of figures in the Tree of Jesse. Following it is the Hymn to the Virgin. The western wall is not painted. Tradition says that work stopped after the painter fell from the scaffolding and died. The rich interior decorations include, in the enclosed porch, the Last Judgement, with its river of fire and enigmatic apocalyptic figures. Suceviţa was a princely residence as well as a fortified monastery. The thick walls today shelter a museum that presents an outstanding collection of historical and art objects. The tomb covers of Ieremia and Simion Movilă – rich portraits embroidered in silver thread – together with ecclesiastical silverware, books and illuminated manuscripts, offer eloquent testimony to Suceviţa’s importance first as a manuscript workshop, then as a printing center. Moldoviţa Ivy-covered walls enclose the graceful church of the Annunciation at Moldoviţa, a foundation dating from the first half of the 15th century, completely reconstructed by Peter Rareş in 1532. The frescoes were painted by Toma of Suceava in 1537. The apse paintings depict the traditional procession of the saints leading up to the Virgin enthroned with the Child in her lap above the narrow east window. Below them a representation of the Paschal lamb reminds the faithful that Christ conquered death in the sacrifice of the Cross. On the south side, an elegant Tree of Jesse on a blue background springs from a recumbent Jesse at the foot of the wall to marshal the ancestry of Christ around the Holy Family. The Siege of Constantinople along the bottom of the south wall depicts Christians routing the infidel with arrows and cannons and miraculous icons being paraded around the ramparts. Still visible are graffiti scratched by Austrian troops in the eighteenth century. On the west end of the church, tall arches light the porch and shelter the depiction of the Last Judgment. The interior frescoes are not obscured by soot as much as in other churches, and the Abbess, armed with breviary and laser pointer, proved ready to help identify the saints and martyrs pictured on the walls of the pronaos. The defensive exterior walls, five meters high and more than a meter thick, incorporate white stone buildings with black-shingled roofs. Nun’s cells line one side of the compound, while in the northwest corner is a restored two-story princely residence now used as a museum of ecclesiastical embroidery and religious art. |
