1690-1918
The last incursion of the Ottomans into Central Europe proved disastrous to them. In 1683, the Austrians and the Poles defeated the Ottomans at the gates of Vienna. Within seven years, they also conquered Buda, Transylvania and abolished the principality. In 1699, in the Treaty of Karlovitz, the Ottomans officially renounced Transylvania in favour of Austria. In Transylvania, Catholic and Protestant efforts to convert the population resulted in open clashes. Concurrently, the Transylvanian nobility was becoming Magyarized, a process virtually completed by the 16th century, when Calvinism was adopted. After granting autonomy to Catholics Szeckely and new Lutherans Saxons, the nobility formed with them "The Union of The Three Nations", a statute aimed at concentrating all the power in the principality in the hands of the three nations: Hungarian (Calvinist nobles), (Catholic) Szeckelies and (Lutheran) Saxons. (Orthodox) Romanians, representing the vast majority of the population, were left with no representation, except the voice they could have through their clergy. Understanding that the religious pressure from all sides would not cease, a part of the Romanian-Orthodox clergy prepared to compromise with the side that would prove more flexible to the needs of the Romanians.
Linguistic and cultural affinities, as well as the much greater flexibility shown by the Catholic Church paid off for the latter. In 1692, Orthodox Bishop Teofil Seremi was established as the Metropolitan of Alba Iulia, as usual under the Calvin dependency. After discussions and negotiations through the Jesuit Ladislau Baranyi, Seremi convoked a synod. On March 21, 1697, the synod decided to unite the Church with Rome under the conditions of the Council of Florence, similarly to the unions of Brest and Muncach of the Ruthenians. The intention was that the Romanian clergy would receive the same rights and immunities as the Latin clergy, while preserving the traditional establishments and the mass. On April 4, 1697, the imperial chancellor Franz Ulrich Kinsky presented the Romanians' request to the governor of Transylvania Georgy Bánffy in Vienna and the imperial approval of the document. The Church was left under existing Calvinist control. Teofil Seremi died in July 1697, presumably by poisoning.
The ambiguity of the situation at the time was emphasized by the next Metropolitan of Transylvania, Atanasie Anghel. He received his ordination as Orthodox Metropolitan of Bucharest, where prince Constantin Brancoveanu of Wallachia had arranged for official instruction to be given to the new metropolitan by Dositei, the Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem. As soon as the Catholics started to realize the promised concessions, the 1697 union gained strength. In response to the July 2, 1698 confirmation of the 1697 privileges by Cardinal Kollonich of Esztergom, Atanasie Anghel summoned a new synod, which passed a "Manifest of Union" on October 7, 1698, signed by 38 high representatives of the Romanian clergy of Transylvania. In 1700, Brancoveanu presented the Romanian Orthodox Metropolitan of Alba Iulia with a substantial financial contribution which he retracted the next year, after a new synod in 1700 validated the union. In 1701, Anghel travelled to Vienna and declared the Metropolitan province of Transylvania was no longer subordinate to Bucharest. Dositei, the Patriarch of Jerusalem and Teodosie, the Metropolitan of Bucharest, presented Anghel with a formal anathema.
In 1700, the Maramureş county congregation decided that the parochial school at Sighet had to be supported with public money.
In 1703, there was a Hungarian uprising against Austria and Catholicism, led by Ferenc Rakoczi. Some Romanians, Ruthenians and Slovaks participated. On June 7, 1703 the curutz won an inconclusive battle against Austrians at Dolha, but were subsequently defeated, although definitively only in 1711. During this uprising, the Hungarian Protestants plundered and destroyed the famous Monastery of Peri in 1703.
After the union, Anghel's difficulties continued. The Calvin intendant was replaced by a Jesuit theologist, Gabriel Hevenessi, whose aggressiveness and absence of diplomacy, according to contemporaries, were surpassed only by his zeal to censure the books printed at Alba Iulia. The support from Wallachia was now completely cut. Due to the Hungarian revolt, the support from Vienna was minimal. In 1707, Rakoczy occupied Alba Iulia and Anghel had to retreat with the imperial troops to Sibiu. In Alba Iulia, the Bishop of Maramureş Iov Tarca, the former counter-candidate of Atanasie Anghel for the metropolitan see, re-established the Romanian Orthodox metropolitan province of Transylvania, with himself as Metropolitan, but was forced to flee to Maramureş, when the city passed again into Austrian hands.
In 1711, Atanasie Anghel, frustrated by the absence of imperial support, again voided the union with Rome, but was dissuaded by the Jesuits, when they finally managed to obtain support from the Emperor. Anghel died in 1713, but it took until December 23, 1715 until the Emperor approved another bishop, Ioan Giurgiu Patachi. Simultaneously, due to major reconstruction in Alba Iulia and resulting demolition of many old buildings, the metropolitan see was moved to Făgăraş. After approval by a papal decree "Indulgentum esse" (1716) and papal bull "Rationi Congruit" (1721), Patachi was festively installed in his position at the "St. Nicolas" Cathedral in Fagaraş on August 17, 1723.
In 1717, the Tatars invaded Maramureş and plundered the wealth of Sighet, much of which was hidden in the reformed church. After bringing much disaster, the Tatars were annihilated in a battle at Cavnic, where a monument was edicted to commemorate the battle. Also, commemorating the battle, a traditional costume is worn during the Christmas period, when the battle was fought, known today under the name of Brondosi.
The adversaries of the Greek-Catholic Church inside the imperial territory were the Protestant nobility of Transylvania, but also the Serbian Orthodox Metropolitan of Karlowitz. The latter's emissary to Transylvania, the Romanian monk Visarion Sarai, succeeded in spontaneously gathering so much support among the locals that it terrified the Austrian authorities. After arresting him, they sent him to the fearful Kufstein prison in Tirol, where he vanished.
The person who was instrumental in establishing the national right of Romanians in Transylvania and forming the union with Rome was the Romanian Greek-Catholic Bishop of Blaj Inocenţiu Micu-Klein. Schooled by the Jesuits in Cluj, trained in theology in Trnava and later a Basilian monk, he was appointed in 1729 by Emperor Charles VI Bishop of Alba Iulia and Fagaraş. He was also awarded the titles of Imperial Councillor and Baron as well as given a seat in the Transylvanian Diet. In 1737, he moved the bishopric seat from Făgăraş to Blaj and in 1741 laid the foundations of the local cathedral. As a member of the Diet, Micu began to press the Habsburg monarchy to fulfill the agreement that conversion to Greek Catholicism would bring with it privileges such as were accorded Roman Catholics and an end to serfdom. First pressing for rights for the clergy and the converts, he soon began to petition for freedom for all Romanians. Micu petitioned the Habsburg court for over forty years to this end. His perseverance ultimately caused both Empress Maria Theresa and the Transylvanian Diet to declare themselves offended. The Diet itself opposed the liberation of the work force or the awarding of political rights to Romanians, considered by the Diet as "moth for the cloth." Exiled in 1744 and forced to give up his bishopric in 1751, Micu died in Rome in 1768.
A visit by the Catholic Bishop Manuil Olsavszky of Muncach, travelling as official envoy of Empress Maria Theresa throughout Transylvania, revealed that the union was in name only and that the locals did not want to receive uniate priests, but demanded that Klein be brought back. Fearing the situation could get much worse, Maria Theresa produced an Edict of Tolerance towards the Orthodox believers on July 13, 1759. It forbade the uniate clergy to persecute them. Two petitions were sent in March 1791 and March 1792 by the leaders of the ethnic Romanians of Transylvania to Emperor Leopold II, demanding equal political rights with the other ethnicities of Transylvania and a share of the Transylvanian Diet proportional to their population (two third). Partially modelled on revolutionary France Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, the Supplex Libellus Valachorum Transsilvaniae (Petition of the Vlachs of Transylvania) documents were drafted by clerics of the Romanians Greek Catholic Church. Rejected, except for the point referring to the free practice of the Orthodox faith, despite the quasi-total support by the population, the document became the rallying point of the Romanians of Transylvania until after World War I.
In the 18th century, Maramureş was known for the export of salt, fur, wine and wooden crafts, while importing jewelry, carpets (from Turkey and the Balkans), fabric, crystal, china (from Czechia, Germany and Italy) and iron crafts (from Holland and Poland). Buştina, Veliky Bicichiv, Vâşcova, Teceu, Hust, Rahau, Ocna Slatina, Taras, Yasinia, Dolha, Borşa and Sighet were the regional towns that emerged during that period. Hust was hosting as many as ten annual fairs.
The 19th century brought economic growth to Maramureş, although the first factories had appeared two centuries earlier. Electricity, post and telephone service reached the region by the end of the century.
During 1870-1913, there was considerable migration to the USA. From Maramureş, Ugocea, Bereg and Ung combined, there were 180,000 legal and up to 400,000 illegal emigrants to the USA. A smaller number of people emigrated to Uruguay, Canada, Argentina and Australia.
In 1900, Ioan Mihalyi de Apşa printed the first volume of the history of the County of Maramureş, "Maramureş Diplomas of XIV – XV centuries", at Sighet.
With the beginning of World War I, Russian troops invaded Yasinea and Rahiv in northeastern Maramureş in September 1914. They were repelled, but at the end of October 1914, while pushing towrds Uzhoc, they invaded also the northest-most villages of Maramureş, around Studene and were again repelled. No further military action took place in Maramureş.
Read more about this topic: History Of Maramureş