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Location:
Maramures lies at the most northwestern border of Romania. It is near the exact physical center of Europe, protected on all sides by mountains. To the south lie the volcanic ranges of Oas, Gutti and Tibles. The systolic Ronda range guards Maramures' eastern border. While to the northeast rise the wild and unexplored peaks of the Maramures Mountains.
The northern border of Maramures, and Romania, is the Tisa River. For many centuries this river and its tributaries were the only access to this part of the world. Along the banks of the Tisa's tributaries, the Iza, the Mara, the Cosau and the Viseu Rivers, are paths made by the first settlers to this region. Across meadows, past terraces and over the endless hills, these paths formed the first arteries of transit. Even today these first paths are a major means of travel through this area.
Touristic sights:
Maramures is the land of ancestral traditions and beautiful winters. Borsa, in Rodna Mountains, is the resort where sometimes you can ski even in summer.
The isolation of the region is the main reason for the perfect preservation of traditional architecture in the villages.
The houses, the churches and other monuments, built many centuries ago, look new and fresh.
The wooden gates of Maramures are famous all over the world.
Ethnograpy:
- The "Merry Cemetery"-Sapanta (18 km from Sighetul Marmatiei), unique in the world, amazing due to its originality. The wooden crosses, sculptured and painted by craftsman Stan Patras, turned it into an authentic museum. The colours of the crosses and the humorous texts on them capture for eternity the essential episodes of life and show the strength of the Romanian spirit, which do not fear death. It can be said that Maramures villages form a huge folk art gallery. On holidays, the image is completed by the locals' garb, vividly coloured, sewn with skill and imagination; the customs are original demonstration of folk art. The famous Maramures gates are authentic "visit cards" of wood sculpture; being realised with skill, their adornment is the traditional element of Maramures: the sun, symbol of life; the most beautiful gates can be seen in the following villages: Sapanta, Vadul Izei, Desesti and Giulesti;
- Botiza -(dowry chests and rugs);
- Viseul de Jos -(folk costume and fabrics);
- Bogdan Voda -(carpets and wickerwork);
- Sacel -(rough red ceramics with old traditional elements).
History:
There is evidence that this region was first settled as far back as 35,000 BC, the Superior Paleolithic era. By the Bronze Age the region of Maramures was well settled, though due to the geography the population was quite sparse.
At the height of the Roman Empire's power the Emperor Traian fought for new lands to feed his growing armies and subjects. With overwhelming numbers and the latest armaments the Romans invaded Dacia.
Maramures, defended not only by men but by mountains, remained free. These "Free Dacians" stayed in contact with their defeated brothers. They supported each other in exchanges of spiritual ideas as well as material goods.
During the following millennium most of modern day Romania was held in bondage by the Romans and other, no less ruthless, landlords. Maramures, hidden and well protected by its natural surroundings, flourished.
The oldest known written document referring to Maramures was a deed written in 1199. The Hungarian King's Chancery, while hunting in Maramures, was nearly killed. A man named Comitele Lawentii saved the chancery's life. As a reward he was given title of the lands of Maramures.
Through the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the presence of documents regarding Maramures increased substantially. From these documents it's been established that the population was organized into small feudal communities known as a "voievodat" (principality). The princes of these estates would send out dispatches and declarations to one another regularly referring to "Tara Maramuresului" (Maramures Country).
The most famous and most revered of these princes was Bogdan of Cuhea. In 1359 Bogdan led an army made up of Maramures villagers and crossed over the mountains to Moldova. There, Bogdan confronted another Maramures Noble, Blac. Blac's tyranny of the Maramures people was supported by the Hungarian King. Blac's influence and oppression had spread throughout Maramures and Moldova. After many fierce battles Bogdan was victorious. Blac was banished. Bogdan proclaimed himself prince and declared Moldova to be an independent state. In honor of his victories the town where he was from changed its name from Cuhea to Bogdan Voda.
Bogdan Voda thus became the first village in Maramures with a Romanian name. Throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the majority of villages in Maramures changed or translated their names from Hungarian to Romanian as Bogdan and his descendants influence grew. By the seventeenth century the Chancery's documents note that the rest of the village names in Maramures were translated into Romanian.
Prince Bogdan had many homes in Maramures. In some of these villages where he lived were built great stone churches. In Bogdan Voda and Giulesti the remains of these churches can still be seen. And in Sighetu-Marmatiei its fifteenth century stone church still stands at the western end of the town center. Since its construction it has been rebuilt and is no longer Romanian Orthodox but Calvinist. None the less, it is one of the most impressive buildings in the Romanesque style of architecture.
Even older than these churches however are many of the wooden churches of Maramures. Those in Iued (1364) and Barsana (1391) are particularly impressive, as is the Peri Monastery (1391) in Sapanta.
During the fifteenth century increasing pressure was put on the people and the land of Maramures by their Hungarian overlords. In an attempt to weaken the local faith a decree stated Romanian Orthodox churches were not to be built of anything sturdier than wood. This gave rise to the most impressive architectural development in all of Maramures, the wooden churches. A culture of wood workers and craftsmen was born that lives to this day. From out of the ugliness of this law arose a uniquely creative and beautiful solution.
Recent arrivals of Hungarian and German colonists were stripping the land of its trees and salt leaving many areas barren and unusable by the local peasants. At the same time they evicted the peasants from their homes and farms. By the sixteenth century the number of peasants without land had increased to an angry and unstable number. Life became terribly difficult for the Maramures peasants.
As the situation worsened peasant uprisings became the norm. This culminated in the "Peasant War" of 1514 led by Gheorghe Doja. The revolt was brutally crushed by the occupying powers. Harsher measures were then implemented to extinguish future outbursts from the peasants.
In 1538 Maramures was fully annexed by Hungarian Transylvania, furthering the strong-armed tactics put in place after the "Peasant War." These new measures included forced religious conversion of the people to Calvinism.
The fifteenth century had brought yet another occupying force to the horizon. Hungary began to lose its colonies including Maramures and then its own country to the Turks. By 1526 the nation of Hungary was defeated at the battle of Mohacs. For the next 150 years Transylvania and Hungary were controlled by the Ottoman Empire. Though Turk control was limited in Maramures it still had a great influence on the region's development.
By 1700 religious oppression was intensifying. To save Romania's Christian beliefs it was agreed to make the Romanian Orthodox Church a part of the Greco-Catholic Church. Doing so, it was believed, would bring Romania under the umbrella of the far more powerful church. It was protection that never came.
After 1860 Maramures underwent a massive campaign of cultural discrimination against non-Romanians. Schools only used the Latin alphabet and Romanian became the only language taught. Most importantly, at the college for teachers in Sighetu-Marmatiei, these practices were indoctrinated into the curriculum of each emerging teacher.
The Second World War brought new troubles to the region. The Axis powers took control of all of Northern Transylvania and Maramures by order of the Dictate of Vienna. The Hungarian language was required in all governmental affairs. Martial law was adopted. People were routinely beaten, jailed and executed.
At the end of the war Maramures, once again, became a part of Romania. But Maramures and Romania were far from free.
The prison in Sighetu-Marmatiei became The "Ministers Prison." Here were kept the intellectuals of Romania. Priests, writers, painters, poets and scholars were starved, tortured and killed. Only a stone's throw from the Soviet border, the prison was seen as a safe location for such "dangerous" people. Today it is a museum to the brutality that communism and its jail system inflicted on the people of Romania.
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