Greater Moldova or Greater Moldavia (; Moldovan Cyrillic: ) is an irredentist concept today used for the credence that the Republic of Moldova should be expanded with lands that used to belong to the Principality of Moldavia or were once inside its political orbit. Historically, it also meant the unification of the lands of the former principality under either Romania or the Soviet Union. Territories cited in such proposals always include Western Moldavia and the whole of Bessarabia, as well as Bukovina and the Hertsa region; some versions also feature parts of Transylvania, while still others include areas of Podolia, or Pokuttia in its entirety. In most of its post-Soviet iterations, "Greater Moldova" is associated with a belief that Moldovans are a distinct people from Romanians, and that they inhabit parts of Romania and Ukraine. It is a marginal position within the Moldovan identity disputes, corresponding to radical forms of an ideology polemically known as "Moldovenism".
The origins of the idea can be traced back to the 1812 annexation of Bessarabia by the Russian Empire, which was regarded as an injustice by the Principality's political elite. Their grievances, formulated as protests to the European powers, were only partly quelled by the brief reunification with southern Bessarabia (1856–1878). During that same interval, Moldavian demands fused into the larger agenda of Romanian nationalism, leading to the 1859 formation of the United Principalities and their shared aspiration toward a Greater Romania. Support for a Greater or Unified Moldavia was manifest among a subgroup of Romanian nationalists who also endorsed regional autonomy. The more particular goal of a restored Greater Moldavia, independent and fully separated from Wallachia, survived in this setting until the 1870s, being encouraged in its own aspirations by the forgeries of Constantin Sion.
Upon the end of World War II, the idea of Greater Moldova was briefly considered by the political apparatus of the Soviet Union. Initial plans were drafted by Ana Pauker and Gherasim Rudi, who wanted Soviet Moldavia (already comprising most of Bessarabia) enlarged westward toward the Siret, with Iași for its capital; their project was vetoed by Joseph Stalin. As a member of the Soviet Moldavian leadership, Nikita Salogor made other concrete proposals; his version made explicit territorial demands on both Romania and the Ukrainian SSR, generating controversy with the latter. Salogor's project was shelved, but, through the likes of Artiom Lazarev, some of its core assumptions were replicated into the 1970s. A nostalgia for the Principality was also implicit in the Soviet celebration of "Moldovan" figures who had lived in Romania. Once Moldova declared its independence in 1991, some core tenets of Greater Moldovan irredentism were tentatively embraced by both the Party of Communists and the Party of Socialists.
History Background
The Principality of Moldavia was founded in the 14th century after nobles from the neighboring voivodeship at Maramureș (notably Bogdan I and Dragoș) succeeded in creating an autonomous and later independent polity in areas claimed by the Kingdom of Hungary. Its history was intertwined with that of Wallachia, the other Romanian principality; in the 1490s, Jakob Unrest, chronicling the rule of Stephen the Great, used "Greater Moldavia" as a byword for Basarab the Old's realm in Wallachia. Immediately after reaching its maximum territorial extent under Stephen, the Moldavian principality became an Ottoman vassal in the 16th century. This tutelage engendered territorial changes, with direct annexations performed by the Sublime Porte in the southern areas. The steppe areas of the south fell to the Nogai Tatars (the "Budjak Horde"), eventually folded within the Ottomans' Silistra Eyalet. The region as a whole became known as the Budjak, but continued to house communities of Moldavian Christians; tradition holds that its northern border with Moldavia was settled by Halil Pasha.
The waning of Ottoman military power also brought its European provinces under threat of encroachment by the Habsburg monarchy. To obtain Habsburg neutrality during the Russian war of 1768, the Porte ceded 70,186 jugăre (400 square kilometers, or 154 square miles) of Moldavian land. This surface was annexed to the Transylvanian Military Frontier, manned by Hungarian-speaking Székelys, resulting in a lasting controversy as to whether or not it belongs to "Székely Land". A more sizable northern region, thereafter known as "Bukovina", was annexed to the Habsburg realm in Galicia in 1774. As noted by contemporary reports, peasants in that region were opposed to the "breakup in two of Moldavia's body", and hoped that Moldavia as a whole would be reunited under the House of Austria. Similar ideas were espoused by a Hungarian nationalist poet of the day, Mihály Csokonai. He wrote about the lands and people of Greater Moldavia in his Marosvásárhelyi gondolatok, in which he hopes the entire region would unify with the Kingdom of Hungary—mainly as a way of ensuring that the Csángós of Moldavia would be politically joined with other Hungarians:
On the other side of the border, Prince Grigore Ghica had hoped to persuade the Ottomans that they should retake Bukovina for Moldavia. As reported by Austrian diplomat Thugut de Paula, "the Moldavians and all other of Ghica's creatures [...] apply all their zeal to depicting the voluntary cession of such a rich area of the country as an act of extraordinary weakness". In Bukovina District, which came to cradle some of the first forms of Romanian nationalism under a Habsburg government, Romanian folklore identified "Greater Moldavia" as the Ottoman-held areas, with Bukovina itself referred to as "Lesser Moldavia" (Moldova Mică).
The Moldavian areas east of the Prut River, which came to be known as "Bessarabia", were annexed by the Russian Empire in 1812. Though organized as a Russian governorate, its kinship with the other parts of Moldavia was not explicitly denied by Russian authorities. They maintained in place the boyar aristocracy, including many families which owned lands on both sides of the border. Russian occupation incidentally reunited Bessarabia with the Budjak. However, the circumstances of Russian rule and the effective partition were seen as unacceptable by various boyar delegates, including the likes of Ioniță Sion and Grigorașcu Sturdza, who pleaded for protection by either the French Empire or Austria. In their official protests, they referred to the regions as "Moldavia's heartland", noting that they preferred Ottoman rule. During the six years which followed annexation, Bessarabians, especially those of Orgeyevsky District, staged popular rallies against the new administration, with as many as 5,000 Moldavian and Gypsy families fleeing across the Prut, into the more familiar Principality. At least one folkloric record from the Budjak, known as Frunză verde lozioară, decried Bessarabia's passage into "Russian slavery" and looked forward to liberation by "our brethren".
By the mid-19th century, the ideal of recovering Bessarabia and Bukovina for Moldavia was already merging with the larger agenda of unifying them with all lands inhabited by ethnic Romanians, in particular Wallachia and Transylvania. This goal was detailed by Mihail Kogălniceanu in his 1843 speech at Academia Mihăileană: "I view as my country everywhere on earth where Romanian is spoken, and as national history the history of all of Moldavia before her fracturing, that of Wallachia, and that of our brothers in Transylvania." In June 1848, upon hearing news of the successful uprising in Wallachia, Bessarabian exile Alecu Russo reported that the moment had come for a revolution to seize "all of us, and all Romanians alike". Russo was in favor of establishing a "great Romanian country" with its border on the Dniester, explicitly against the smaller goal of reuniting "Moldavia with her daughters". Within the next generation of Romanian nationalists, scholar Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu, himself a refugee from Bessarabia (and possibly radicalized there under the influence of Narodniks), alerted Romanians to the fact that "Bessarabia" was a name fabricated by Russian sources, and that the province as a whole had "existed within Moldavia's ancient borders."
The rump Moldavian principality merged with Wallachia in 1859, thus forming the United Principalities as the first modern Romanian state. Its establishment was encouraged by the Treaty of Paris, from which the new country also gained southern Bessarabia (comprising only parts of the Budjak). For Moldavians and Romanians in general, that partial restoration constituted a "platonic consolation", by implying that the 1812 takeover had been illegal; the Moldavian militia moved into the region to the tune of Vasile Alecsandri's March of Bessarabia, which boasted a return on "the land we once owned". By the time of its reintegration, the area was heavily populated by Bulgarians and Gagauz, who formed pockets of resistance to Romanian rule; following the Romanian War of Independence and the Treaty of Berlin, these were retaken by Russia, with Romania receiving Northern Dobruja as a compromise.
In parallel, the Principalities experienced episodes of obstruction or sedition by those who still identified with Moldavian statehood. Already opposing union (though not kinship) with Wallachia in the 1840s and 1850s, some Moldavian boyars advocated for the reintegration of Bessarabia within an independent Moldavia. Examples of this discourse include Constantin Sion and his historical forgery, the so-called Chronicle of Huru, published by Gheorghe Asachi in 1856. The work was investigated, months after surfacing, by a pan-Romanian commission under Kogălniceanu, and widely discredited as a result. However, it was again republished in 1879, possibly with political intent; its sponsor may have been the Moldavian secessionist Teodor Boldur-Lățescu. The cause of Moldavian statehood was also embraced by Simion Bărnuțiu, who "supported Union as a confederation, with Moldavia as a distinct juridical person, with her own ancient rights, her history, her inalienable demands on Bukovina and Bessarabia".
Greater Romania as Greater Moldavia Development of the concept The establishment in 1867 of Austria-Hungary included the autonomous Duchy of Bukovina in the Austrian dominion. In 1875, the latter prepared for celebration of the annexation's centennial, causing an uproar among pan-Romanian nationalists and supporters of Moldavian territorial integrity. That year, Kogălniceanu printed a work which exposed the circumstances of Bukovina's cession, and which noted: "when not in a position to grab a country in its entirety, [Austria] would be content with bits and even morsels". Sion and Bărnuțiu's approaches were also contrasted by poet Mihai Eminescu of Botoșani, who took up Romanian nationalism, including using racial anthropology to prove the antiquity of Romanians in Bukovina. In 1876, he referred to Bukovina as the stolen "maternal beehive of unified Moldavia", commending Prince Ghica for his attempts to resist the annexation. With his extended critique of the Berlin Treaty, Eminescu made note of Bessarabia as traditionally integrated with Moldavia as a "distinct country".