The history of the potato in Romania

THE  HISTORY  OF THE POTATO  IN  ROMANIA

          The history of the potato in Romania as a cultivated plant, probably, starts at the beginning of the 19^th century. However, it may have been planted much earlier on a smaller scale in private gardens, at least in Transylvania. First, it was planted in Transylvania and from there it spread to Wallachia and Moldavia.

          From a documentary point of view, the potato appeared on Transylvania’s territory on 14th March 1769 when officials of  Grand Royal Guberniat of  Transylvania ( Sibiu ) gave out a circular letter on the potato crop because there were serious voices of the people who opposed to the culture of this plant.

          According to C. Teodorescu, in the district of  Brașov, in 1780, Bucșa – birăul  from the New Tohan reported to the public notary  that in that year nobody cultivated apples in the ground. In 1781 people from Zărnești reported to the authorities that the production of potatoes was going well.

          At the beginning of the 19th century, the potato spread because a series of measures were taken by the local and central authorities. Gheorghe  Șincai, in his paper  `` The advising to the economy of field  `` ( 1806 ) mentions the potato under the name of   `` crumpene ``  and  `` the pears from ground  ``. The book, written in Romanian language with cyrillic letters, was sent to the Romanians outside Transylvania.

          In 1814, Vasile Moga, the first Orthodox bishop of Ardeal during the Hapsburg administration, commands to the priests to urge people cultivate `` picioci ``.

          Due to the famine from 1814, the governor of Transylvania, Gheorghe Banffy II, gave a circular letter which advised people to cultivate potatoes even in the absence of the animals which might have helped them. It seems that during the reigning of Scarlat Callimachi (1812-1819) the potato crop was introduced into Moldavia, being brought from Transylvania, according to the farming expert Simion P. Radianu in 1906. This information is confirmed by the work of the Austrian diplomat Ștefan Raicevici who says that a French teacher held land on lease in Moldova, in 1812, land which was cultivated with potatoes. From the work of Nicolae Iorga called  `` The documents of  Callimachi family ``( 1902) results that the Callimachi, in order  to extend the culture of potatoes, said to A. I. Beldiman to translate in Greek language a brochure called ```Teaching people how to make bread out of potatoes ``( printed in Iași in 1818 ). This might be the first book in Romanian  about the potato.

          In Wallachia, the chronicle of  Ioan Gheorghe Caradja ( 1812-1818 ) reminds us about the selling of potatoes from Ardeal on the Bucharest market and about the crop of potatoes made by peasants from around the capital.        

 History teacher,

Vasile Ciubotaru