Photo album dedicated to Centenary of Great Union launched in Moldovan capital

Chisinau, 18 December /MOLDPRES/ - A photo album titled, 1918. Cum s-a făcut România Mare (1918. How the Greater Romania was Created), dedicated to the Centenary of the Great Union of Romania, was launched at the National Library (BNRM) on 17 December evening.    

The work was made in partnership with the associations, Centre of Studies for Romanian Resources and Ars Historica, History Faculty of the Bucharest University, with the support of DIGI 24 and Tuca Zbarcea & Associates, by professor Marius Diaconescu from the Bucharest University and researcher George Damian, with a foreword by President of the Romanian Academy Ioan Aurel Pop.    

Contacted by MOLDPRES, researcher George Damian said that the aforementioned photo album had 200 photographs and maps, digitized from collections and funds of Romania’s National Archive in 2018. The collection of digitized photos and the project Saecularia.ro has more than 2,000 pictures, with those 200 pictures selected for the photo album showing the way of the Romanians beginning with the First World War till the coronation of King Ferdinand and Queen Mary. “You will find here the most important photos from 100 years ago, which illustrate the events which led to the Union of the Romanians from the 1918 year,” George Damian noted.   

For her part, BNRM director Elena Pintilei, said that this work completed a string of works dedicated to the Centenary of the Great Union, launched during this year both in Moldova and in Romania.    

”The novelty of this work, signed by researchers Marius Diaconescu and George Damian, consists in the fact that it gathers between its covers over 200 photos from collections of Romania’s National Archive, as well as epoch maps edited for the first time ever. In the book’s foreword, President of the Romanian Academy Ioan Aurel Pop says, inter alia, that “the photograph brings light to the written word and the term ”map” (charta) has the same etymology as the word “book,” which is a sign that the worlds of cartography and erudition interfere, complete each other.” The information comprised in the album is presented in the Romanian and English languages. This gives possibility for the book to be used by a wide range of researchers and by all those interested in the Act of Union from 1918, Elena Pintilei stressed.       

In the context, historian Ion Negrei said that the work would be of real use in the research and teaching activity.