One of the goals of Russia’s Eastern policy was to turn Moldavia and Wallachia, the two Romanian principalities north of the Danube, from Ottoman vassals into a controllable buffer zone and a springboard for future military operations against Constantinople. Russia on the Danube describes the divergent interests and uneasy cooperation between the Russian officials and the Moldavian and Wallachian nobility in a key period between 1812 and 1834. Victor Taki’s meticulous examination of the plans and memoranda composed by Russian administrators and the Romanian elite underlines the crucial consequences of this encounter. The Moldavian and Wallachian nobility used the Russian-Ottoman rivalry in order to preserve and expand their traditional autonomy. The comprehensive institutional reforms born out of their interaction with the tsar’s officials consolidated territorial statehood on the lower Danube, providing the building blocks of a nation state. The main conclusion of the book is that although Russian policy was driven by self-interest, and despite the Russophobia among a great part of the Romanian intellectuals, this turbulent period significantly contributed to the emergence, several decades later, of modern Romania.

Excerpt from Across Russia: From the Baltic to the Danube From Paris to Stockholm is a long distance on the map of Europe, hut in these days of swift and well-arranged transit, long distances are easily and rapidly traversed. One can cross the continent by rail, and by continuous travel make the journey in five days; but if he finds rest as well as recreation on the sea, and loves a boat, he can cross the English Channel and go from London or Hull to Gothenburg, and thence b}r rail, or through the Gotha River and the Swedish lakes, to the capital of Scandinavia. Let no one fancy, however, that the German Ocean will be untrue to its record. Boisterous and rude, like the ancient Teutons, it sports with its guests in 110 gentle fashion, and brings enemies prostrate before its shrine. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.