Nicolae Constantin Batzaria (; , ; last name also Besaria, Bațaria or Bazaria; also known under the pen names Moș Nae, Moș Ene and Ali Baba; November 20, 1874 – January 28, 1952), was an Aromanian cultural activist, Ottoman statesman and Romanian writer. A schoolteacher and inspector of Aromanian education within Ottoman lands, he stood for the intellectual and political current, espoused by the Macedo-Romanian Cultural Society, which closely identified with both Romanian nationalism and Ottomanism. Batzaria was trained at the University of Bucharest, where he became a disciple of historian Nicolae Iorga, and established his reputation as a journalist before 1908—the string of publications he founded, sometimes with financial support from the Kingdom of Romania, includes Românul de la Pind and Lumina. During his thirties, he joined the clandestine revolutionary movement known as the Young Turks, serving as its liaison with Aromanian factions in Macedonia and Rumelia. He was briefly imprisoned for such activities, but the victorious Young Turk Revolution in 1908 brought him to the forefront of Ottoman politics.
A member of the Ottoman Senate in 1908–1915, Batzaria was also Minister of Public Works under the Three Pashas. He was tasked with several diplomatic missions, including attending the London Conference of 1913, and sought to preserve the purpose of Ottomanism by seeking tactical alliances against, and finally with, the Kingdom of Bulgaria. Alerted by the Pashas' World War I alliances and their reliance on an exclusivist Turkish nationalism, he soon after quit the Ottoman political scene and left into voluntary exile. Naturalized a Romanian in early 1915, he debuted in local politics as a Nationalist-Conservative, switching his allegiance toward the Entente Powers—favoring war against Bulgaria and the Ottomans alike. The fulfillment of Greater Romania in the interwar era saw him affiliating with a number of political movements, from the People's Party to the National Peasants' Party, before he finally settled for the National Liberals in the early 1930s. A member of the Romanian Senate and Assembly of Deputies, each for one term, he was also Prefect of Timiș-Torontal in April–May 1931.
In tandem with his political involvement, Batzaria became a prolific contributor to Romanian literature, producing works of genre fiction and children's literature. Together with comic strip artist Marin Iorda, he created Haplea, one of the most popular characters in early Romanian comics. Batzaria also collected and retold fairy tales from various folkloric traditions, while publishing original novels for adolescents and memoirs of his life in Macedonia. Batzaria's scholarship and activism seeped into affection for minority groups, including the Gagauz, the Romani people, the Armenians, and, initially, the Jews. He was active on the staff of Romania's leading leftist journals, Adevărul and Dimineața, as well as founder of the latter's supplement for children, before switching his allegiance to the right-wing Universul. His turn toward the latter was signaled by the Romanian far-right as the adoption of antisemitism, and, by 1937, he had become explicit in his sympathy for the fascist Iron Guard; during World War II, he supported the Ion Antonescu regime, and was enthusiastically anti-Soviet in his articles and children's prose. Batzaria was banned, persecuted, and finally imprisoned by the postwar communist regime. He spent his final years in obscure captivity, dying of spinal cancer.
Biography
Early life and activities Batzaria was a native of Kruševo (), a village in Ottoman-ruled Manastir vilayet, presently in North Macedonia. His Aromanian family had numerous branches outside that region: migrant members had settled in the Kingdom of Romania, in Anatolia, and in the Khedivate of Egypt.Zbuchea (1999), p. 79 Nicolae's father had stayed in Kruševo, but by 1873 had joined in the effort, led by Steriu N. Cionescu, to set up some of the first Romanian-sponsored schools for the Aromanians.Cordescu, pp. 56–57, 59 The future politician and author was raised in the Eastern Orthodox Church, and later affiliated with its Romanian branch, being an occasional contributor to its program of catechesis;"Informațiuni", in Biserica și Școala, Issue 18/1942, p. 151 he grew up in Kruševo, where he studied under renowned Aromanian teacher Sterie Cosmescu. He attended the Romanian High School of Bitola, where he learned French with the Lazarist Jean-Claude Faveyrial—who also introduced him to theater, by making him appear in an amateur play.Batzaria (1932), p. 1 During a summer vacation in Kruševo, he attempted to stage his own version of a play by Vasile Alecsandri. As he recalled in 1932, the project ended up as a "pummeling among us thespians", prompted by the male lead's refusal to appear in travesti.Batzaria (1932), p. 2
Graduating in 1891,Cordescu, p. 192 Batzaria was sent to further his education in Romania, at the Faculties of Letters and Law, University of Bucharest.Karpat, p. 563; Zbuchea (1999), pp. 62–63, 79. See also Batzaria (1942), pp. 37–39 "Batzaria Nicolae", biographical note in Cronologia della letteratura rumena moderna (1780-1914) database, at the University of Florence's Department of Neo-Latin Languages and Literatures; retrieved August 19, 2009Eduard Antonian, "Turcia, Junii Turci și armenii în memoriile lui Nicolae Batzaria", in Ararat, Issue 8/2003, p. 6 The young man became a dedicated disciple of Romanian nationalist theorist Nicolae Iorga, who was inaugurating his lectures in history during Batzaria's first year there."Deschiderea cursurilor Universității populare 'Nicolae Iorga' de la Vălenii de Munte", in Universul, July 17, 1943, p. 5Batzaria (1942), pp. 37–38 He shared Iorga's belief, consolidated with time, that the Aromanians were not an isolated Balkan ethnicity, but part of larger Romanian ethnic community. As he himself explained, "the Romanian people [is] a unitary and indivisible body, regardless of the region wherein historical circumstances have settled it", and the "Macedonian Romanians" constituted "the most aloof branch of the Romanian trunk".Batzaria (1942), p. 41 Lacking funds for his tuition, Batzaria never graduated. Instead, he earned his recognition as a journalist, educator, and analyst. A polyglot, he could speak Turkish, Greek, Bulgarian, and Serbian, in addition to French, his native Aromanian, and the Romanian language.Karpat, p. 563 He regarded the latter two as closely related, with Aromanian as the less prestigious, subordinate dialect of a language that had originated north of the Danube.Lascu, pp. 52–53 In one article, he acknowledged that, without immersion, Aromanians would struggle to understand the metropolitan language, or "Daco-Romanian". Literary critic and memoirist Barbu Cioculescu, who befriended Batzaria as a child, recalls that the Aromanian journalist "spoke all Balkan languages", and "perfect Romanian" with a "brittle" accent. Barbu Cioculescu, "Soarele Cotrocenilor", in Litere, Issue 2/2011, p. 11
While in Romania, Batzaria also began his collaboration with Romanian journals: Adevărul, Dimineața, Flacăra, Arhiva, Ovidiu and Gândul Nostru.Zbuchea (1999), p. 82 Also notable is his work with magazines published by the Aromanian diaspora. These publications depicted the Aromanians as a subgroup of the Romanian people.Zbuchea (1999), pp. 81–82 They include Peninsula Balcanică ("The Balkan Peninsula", the self-styled "Organ for the Romanian interests in the Orient"), Macedonia and Frățilia ("Brotherhood"). The latter, published from both Bitola and Bucharest, and then from the Macedonian metropolis of Thessaloniki, had Nicolae Papahagi and Nuși Tulliu on its editorial board.Gică, p. 6. See also Batzaria (1932), p. 2 Batzaria made his editorial debut with a volume of anecdotes, Părăvulii—the title, which has to be translated for speakers of Romanian, approximates to "Parables" or "Comparisons".Hristu Cândroveanu, "Mapamond. Părăvuliile lui Batzaria", in Luceafărul, Vol. XXXII, Issue 45, November 1989, p. 8 Printed in Bucharest in 1901, it was in fact self-published by Batzaria and Papahagi's own imprint, called Biblioteca Populară Aromânească ("Aromanian People's Library"). The volume reportedly made him an instant celebrity in Aromanian circles.Șerban Cioculescu, "Breviar. Un veac de poezie aromână (II)", in România Literară, Issue 48/1985, p. 7
Batzaria returned to Macedonia as a schoolteacher, educating children at the Ioannina school (January–June 1894), and subsequently at his alma mater in Bitola; he was also employed by the school of Gopeš, between September 1903 and January 1904.Cordescu, pp. 84, 191, 204. See also Karpat, p. 563; Zbuchea (1999), pp. 79–80 Around that time, he reportedly met the younger Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk), who was studying at Monastir Military High School.Mihail Guboglu, "Contemporanul enciclopedic. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk", in Contemporanul, Issue 21/1983, p. 5 In 1899, Batzaria and his colleagues notably persuaded Take Ionescu, the Romanian Education Minister, to allocate some 724,000 lei as a grant to Macedonian schools, and virulently protested when later governments halved this annual income.Zbuchea (1999), p. 80 He then became chief inspector of the Romanian educational institutions in the Ottoman provinces of Kosovo and Salonika.Hanioğlu, p. 259; Karpat, p. 563; Zbuchea (1999), pp. 79, 82 Historian Gheorghe Zbuchea, who researched the self-identification of Aromanians as a Romanian subgroup, sees Batzaria as "the most important representative of the national Romanian movement" among early 20th century Ottoman residents,Gheorghe Zbuchea, "Varieties of Nationalism and National Ideas in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Southeastern Europe", in Răzvan Theodorescu, Leland Conley Barrows (eds.), Studies on Science and Culture. Politics and Culture in Southeastern Europe, UNESCO-CEPES, Bucharest, 2001, p. 247. and "without doubt one of the most complex personalities illustrating the history of trans-Danubian Romanianism". Batzaria's debut in Macedonian cultural debates came at a turning point: through her political representatives, Romania was reexamining the scope of her involvement in the Macedonian question, and asserting that it held no ambition to annex Aromanian land.Zbuchea (1999), pp. 63–65
From Macedonia, Nicolae Batzaria became a correspondent of Neamul Românesc, a brochure and later magazine published in Romania by Iorga. At that stage, Batzaria, with Tulliu, Nicolae Papahagi and Pericle Papahagi, founded the Association of Educationists in Service to the Romanian People of Turkey (that is, the Aromanians), a union of professionals based in Bitola. They were on a mission to Romania, where their demand for more funding sparked lively debates among Romanian politicians, but Education Minister Spiru Haret eventually signed off a special Macedonian fund, worth 600,000 lei (later increased to over 1 million).Zbuchea (1999), pp. 80–81 The group was also granted a private audience with King Carol I, who showed sympathy for the Aromanian campaign and agreed to receive Batzaria on several other occasions. Perceived as a figure of importance among the Aromanian delegates, Batzaria also began his collaboration with the magazine Sămănătorul, chaired at the time by Iorga.Zbuchea (1999), pp. 80, 81. See also Batzaria (1942), p. 41
Lumina, Deșteptarea and Young Turks affiliation