The two banks of the Dniester developed independently, not coming under common rule until 1812 when the Moldavian Bessarabia region was annexed to the Russian Empire. Despite annexation, the province maintained strong cultural ties to Romania and quickly moved to reunite with Romania following the collapse of the Russian Empire in 1918. Thus, in 1924 when the Bolsheviks wanted to strengthen support in Bessarabia, the region of Transnistria was deliberately carved out of Ukraine to become the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR). It served as a bridgehead for propaganda and expansion into Romania in a ploy to engender Communist support to eventually reclaim all of Bessarabia under Soviet rule. The opposite banks of the Dniester did not become a common administrative district until 1940 when the German-Soviet nonaggression pact ceded Bessarabia to the Soviet Union. At that point, the Moldovan ASSR (approximately modern-day Transnistria) was combined with Bessarabia and the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic (MSSR) was formed.33 The MSSR remained a part of the Soviet Union for 50 years, and the industrialized Transnistrian region was known especially for its industrial development and high standard of living, while the Bessarabia region remained more rural.34
Moldova: A Romanian Province Under Russian Rule Download.zip
The current territory of Romania was divided in the Middle Ages (ca. 14th century AD) into three different political structures: Wallachia, Moldavia, and Transylvania. Dobrudja was, during most of its medieval history, under Ottoman rule. During the next several centuries, the historical provinces of Romania were continuously under the suzerainty of the Byzantine, Austro-Hungarian, Habsburg, Ottoman, and Russian Empires. However, these empires had no major demographic impact, except in Transylvania, which underwent a massive colonization by Székelys, Saxons, and Hungarians under the domination of the Kingdom of Hungary between the 10th and 13th centuries [7]. 2ff7e9595c
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