Alexandru Ioan Cuza

Alexandru Ioan Cuza (. . Known as Prince Alexandru Ioan I.; * 8 ​​Märzjul / March 20 1820greg in Huşi, then Moldova, Romania today, † May 15 1873 in Heidelberg) was the founder and first ruler of Romania (1859 - 1866).

Life

Cuza united 1859, the principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, and thus established the foundation for later Romania. On 24 December 1861 he proclaimed under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire the state România (Romania ) with its capital in Iaşi, which a year later - after the two countries were formally united - was replaced by Bucharest.

After the French model he began and his Prime Minister Mihail Kogălniceanu to modernize the country and to reorganize the ownership of land. Result was the unwillingness of local church leaders and nobility on, but also resistance from Russia and the Ottoman Empire. His opponents wanted to make the union of the two principalities reversed. The solution should be to appeal a European prince to the throne. A conspiratorial group of military invaded in the early morning hours of 11 Februarjul. / February 23 1866greg. to the palace and forced the prince to abdicate. In the following days he was crossing borders outside the country.

Now place was free for the successor Karl of Hohenzollern- Sigmaringen, who was officially charged on March 26, 1866 as the new prince.

Alexandru Ioan Cuza died on 15 May 1873 Heidelberg Baden in exile.

Honors

On July 3, 2011, the unveiling of the bust of Al. I. Cuza place in the garden city of Heidelberg. The bust, the work of sculptor Constantin Ionescu, is a gift of the circle Prahova and the Museum of Archaeology and History Prahova to the city of Heidelberg.

In a small park in Bucharest, which forms an access to the Patriarch Cathedral, stands a bronze statue of the prince. In the Romanian capital, also a park was named after the founder of the state.