Moldau

The principality of Moldavia under Stephen the Great, who reigned for forty-seven years, built dozens of churches and was hailed by the pope as a bulwark of Christendom. The cave monasteries of Orheiul Vechi attest to eremitic life continuous since the thirteenth century.

The principality of Moldavia, founded in the fourteenth century, reached its zenith under Stephen the Great, who repeatedly repelled the Ottomans. It then became tributary to the Porte.

In 1812 Russia annexed the eastern part, Bessarabia. Reunited with Romania in 1918, it was retaken by the USSR in 1940 and turned into the Moldavian Soviet republic, with a policy of Russification and Cyrillic script.

Independent in 1991, Moldova immediately experienced the Transnistria conflict, frozen since 1992. Long Europe's poorest country, it obtained Union candidate status on 23 June 2022, at the same time as Ukraine, and opened accession negotiations in June 2024.