Iaşi

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Template:Infobox City in Romania| website=http://www.primaria-iasi.ro/| car number plates=IS| }}

Iaşi (also known outside Romania as Jassy; pronunciation in Romanian: Template:IPA) is the capital city of Iaşi County in north-eastern Romania, in the informal region of Moldova.

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Geography

The city of Iaşi lies on the Bahlui river, a tributary of the Jijia (tributary of the Prut). The surrounding country is one of uplands and woods, featuring the monasteries of Cetăţuia, Frumoasa, Galata (with nearby mineral springs), and the dendrologic park of Repedea. Iaşi itself stands amid vineyards and gardens, partly on two hills, partly in the in-between valley.

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Population

  • 1900: 78,000
  • 1992: 344,425
  • 2002: 316,094; Population density: 3417/km². (Iaşi is the second largest city in Romania, after Bucharest.)
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Etymology

Scholars have different theories on the origin of the name "Iaşi". Some believe the city received its German name in the late 14th century (perhaps as the German name for possibly Cuman hunters or bowmen - jägers). Others argue that the name originates with the Sarmatian tribe Iazyges, one mentioned by Ovid as "Ipse vides onerata ferox ut ducata Iasyx/ Per media Istri plaustra bubulcus aquas" and "Jazyges et Colchi Metereaque turba Getaque/ Danubii mediis vix prohibentur aquis". A nowadays lost inscription on a Roman milestone [1] found near Osijek, Croatia by Matija Petar Katancic [2] in the 18th century, mentions the existence of a Jassiorum municipium[3].

The city is first mentioned in a 1408 document by Moldavian Prince (Voivode) Alexandru cel Bun.

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History

Image:Iasi 17th century2.0.jpg

Around 1564, Prince Alexandru Lăpuşneanu moved the Moldavian capital from Suceava to Iaşi. Between 1561 and 1563, a school and a Lutheran church were founded by the Greek adventurer Prince, Ioan Iacob Heraclid. In 1640, Vasile Lupu established the first school in which the mother-tongue replaced Greek, and set up a printing press in the Byzantine Trei Ierarhi Church (Church of the Three Hierarchs; built 1635–39). In 1643, the first volume ever printed in Moldavia was issued in Iaşi. Image:RO IS Hotel Traian.JPG The city was burned down by the Tatars in 1513, by the Ottomans in 1538, by the Imperial Russian troops in 1686. In 1734, it was hit by the plague.

Through the Peace of Iaşi, the sixth Russo-Turkish War was brought to a close in 1792. A Greek revolutionary maneuver and occupation under Alexander Ypsilanti and the Filiki Eteria (1821, at the beginning of the Greek War of Independence) led to the storming of the city by the Turks in 1822. In 1844 there was a severe conflagration.

Between 1565 and 1859, the city was the capital of Moldavia; then, between 1859 and 1862, both Iaşi and Bucharest were de-facto capitals of the United Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia (the Danubian Principalities). In 1862, when the union of the two principalities was recognized under the name of Romania, the national capital was established in Bucharest. For the loss caused to the city in 1861 by the removal of the seat of government to Bucharest the constituent assembly voted 148,150 lei to be paid in ten annual instalments, but no payment was ever made.

Iaşi's primitive houses of timber and plaster were mostly swept away after 1860, when brick or stone came into general use, and better streets were cut through the network of narrow, unsanitary lanes.

During World War I, Iaşi was the capital of a severly reduced Romania for two years, following the Central Powers' occupation of Bucharest on December 6 1916. The capital was returned to Bucharest after the defeat of Imperial Germany and its allies in November 1918.

In May 1944, Iaşi became the scene of ferocious fighting between Romanian-Nazi German forces and the advancing Soviet Red Army. The elite German Panzergrenadier Division Großdeutschland won an impressive defensive victory at the Battle of Târgul Frumos, a location near Iaşi. The battle was the object of several NATO studies during the Cold War. By July, Iaşi had been taken by Soviet forces.


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Jewish History of Iaşi

Iaşi also figures prominently in Jewish history. Records of Jews exist from the 16th century, and by mid-19th century, the city was at least one-third Jewish. In 1855, it was the home of the first-ever Yiddish-language newspaper, Korot Haitim, and, in 1876, the site of what was arguably the first-ever professional Yiddish theater performance (See Abraham Goldfaden).

By 1930 there were over 30,000 Jews and over 127 synagogues. After World War II, it played a prominent part in the revival of Yiddish culture in Romania: from 1949 to 1964, Iaşi was home to a second company of the State Jewish Theater. Today, Iaşi has a Jewish population of 600.

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The Iaşi Pogrom

During the early part of World War II, Iaşi was the site of a pogrom which was the largest massacre of Jews in Romania. During the war, while the full scale of the Holocaust remained generally unknown to the Allied Powers, the Iaşi pogrom stood as one of the known, well-documented examples of Axis brutality toward the Jews.

The pogrom lasted from June 29–July 6, 1941, and approximately 14,000 people, or half the Jewish population, was massacred either in the pogrom itself (around 2,000 Jews), or in its aftermath (around 12,000 Jews), and the rest were deported. Under express orders from military dictator and German ally Ion Antonescu, the city was to be "cleansed" of its Jewish population. Orders also specified that Section Two of the General Headquarters of the Romanian army and the Special Intelligence Service (SSI) of Romania were to spread rumors of Jewish treachery in the press, including ones that Jews were guiding Soviet military aircraft by placing lights in their houses' chimneys[4]. A systematic massacre by the Iaşi police, Romanian and German soldiers, and a portion of the citizens of Iaşi followed; the remaining Jewish population was loaded onto overcrowded, sealed "death trains" that drove slowly back and forth across the country until most of their passengers were killed by hyperthermia, thirst, or infection and bleeding. Six non-Jewish citizens of Iaşi are credited with saving around one hundred Jews (see Righteous Among the Nations), but, according to the official Romanian report on the subject, the vast majority of the population of the city did nothing to intervene, and a certain portion joined in the killing.

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Attractions

Image:Iasi cultural palace.jpg Iaşi is an outstanding educational centre, and preserves some beautiful pieces of architecture, such as the Trei Ierarhi Church and the neo-Gothic Palace of Culture (the site of four museums - of History, of Technology, of Ethnography, and of Art). Almost all buildings in the old city centre were demolished during the Communist regime, with Soviet-style blocks of flats built in their stead.

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Churches

Image:Trei ierarhi.jpg

Iaşi is the seat of the Romanian Orthodox Church Metropolitan bishopric of Moldavia, and of a Roman Catholic archbishopric. The city houses more than 40 churches. The oldest one is Saint Nicholas, dating from the reign of Stephen the Great (1457-1504); perhaps the finest, however, are the 17th century older metropolitan church, Saint Spiridion and Trei Ierarhi, the last a curious example of Byzantine art, erected in 1639 or 1640 by Vasile Lupu, and adorned with countless gilded carvings on its outer walls and twin towers. Other beautiful churches, surrounded by big walls, are: Galata (1581), Golia (17th century), Cetăţuia (the end of the 17th century) and Frumoasa (18th century).

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Education, science

Iaşi is home to the oldest Romanian university University of Iaşi), opened by (and nowadays named after) Domnitor Alexandru Ioan Cuza in 1860. The city is host to five universities, and is widely regarded as the cultural "heart" of the Old Kingdom (that is Moldavia, Wallachia, and Dobruja - the three region comprised in Romania until 1918).

A society of physicians and natural historians has existed in Iaşi since the early part of the 19th century, and a number of periodicals are published. One of the oldest medical universities in Romania is in Iaşi - founded in 1879. It is now known as University of Medicine and Pharmacy "Grigore T. Popa".


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People

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Sister cities

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External links

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References

cs:Iaşi de:Iaşi et:Iaşi eo:Iaşi fr:Iassy he:יאשי lv:Jasi hu:Jászvásár nl:Iaşi ja:ヤシ (ルーマニア) pl:Jassy ro:Iaşi scn:Iaşi fi:Iaşi sv:Iaşi uk:Яси (місто) wa:Iaşi

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