Barbu Lautaru (The Fiddler)
Barbu Lautaru rustled up his physical and artistic resources, desirous to make an impression on Franz Liszt whom he met during the great Hungarian virtuoso's visit to Moldavia. Their encounter became famous thanks to an article carried by the French weekly La Vie Parisienne,
Descriptio Moldaviae
VIII. On the customs of the court And on the days when there are no banquets, the table for the Prince's lunch is more often than not laid in the small hall, but often enough also in the big hall or in the women's quarters (gynaeceo). Two of the high rank boyars
The Pleasures Of Life
excerpt It happened, not too often, but especially after a theater evening followed by dull group discussions at a terrace forgotten open. Camil, the second day after the torture, ran wild. He met Sandu, the sports teacher, the scare of the second division at rugby, the
The Litter Pit
excerpts At the end of every winter, in a hall illuminated by electric lights and covered by wooden floors, near the Central Station, at Locomotiva, the Craftsmen's Ball was the event of the season. Craftsmen from all over Bucharest brought their wives to party and
Lent
In General Ionescu's garden, the April dusk brought a harsh wind and sprayed dust in the horizon like a bluish mist, spreading heaps of apricot tree flowers over the fresh vegetable beds. Ion, the general's first orderly, in charge of sweeping the flowers laid
Sorrel Leaves Stuffed With Urdă (Ricotta) Cheese
1. 5 kg. urdă (ricotta) cheese, 1 cup rice, 2 bunches scallions, 3 bunches fresh dill, 2 kg. sorrel leaves, 1 fist-sized ball butter, 3-4 tbs. flour, 1 pitcher sour cream, 2 cups borş**, 1 bowl tomato juice, salt, pepper. Pass the cheese through a grinder. Add 1 bunch
Gastronomic Show
Only there isn't a show without protocol. Only the uneducated imagine that to lay the table and, especially, to have someone for dinner are trifles. When you invite someone to dinner you don't do him a favour. That's why you have to give him the impression
A Feast At The Monastery
excerpt In the end, after much talky talk, the priest managed to completely lay the guilt on Father Mitrofan from the monastery, who was now to be held accountable and punished. And since there was nothing there to eat, the priest's wife being sick, priest Bolindache
Editor's Note - Memento Vivere
It seems almost provocative to launch such an issue on the local pleasures, pastimes and delights, while nowadays a troublesome Romania appears as plunged into unending economic and social difficulties, striving to cope with various shortcomings and weaknesses. However,
The Romanian Death Iconography Or A Different Kind Of Assisted Death
In the field of iconography the rhetoric of the end manifested itself initially as a history of silences, the absence of the motif being possibly equally significant as its presence since, as Michel Vovelle demonstrated, images interest us as expression of a selective, oblique
The Funeral Maple
excerpts The cosmic tree, whose root, trunk and branches uphold – by dividing yet uniting – the three cosmic levels, is the same as the funeral tree, because, to the folk mentality, the cosmic tree is the only passageway to the other realm that the soul of the dead
Enemies And Friends Of Man II
excerptsDEATHDeath, whom some mistake for Samodiva, Sila Samodiva or Salea Samodiva, is the invisible spirit that takes away any man's soul, irrespective of the fact that the latter is old or young, rich or poor, happy or unhappy with his life, at the moment when it