<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>In this study we have resumed the problem of Neolithic settlements with a complex architecture (defense systems with ditches, palisades, towers, bastions; residential buildings; cult constructions; social constructions) which support the idea of a proto-urban organization since the PPN. We have analyzed current definitions of cities and fairs, which mainly reflect situations from classical antiquity and the Middle Ages, but they cannot be applied to prehistoric realities, which, according to interdisciplinary research, offer another perspective. We also believe that religion too has played an important part in these sites, some of them being real centers of worship.</abstract>

Are there cities and fairs in the neolithic? Part I – from PPN to late Neolithic (Part II is refering to Copper Age)

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
Birth was one of the most magical, miraculous, and blessed events of post-paleolithic spirituality. The Mesolithic - Early Neolithic rock art paintings of the Ranaldi Shelter (Southern Italy) give distinct visual evidence to a universal subject: the woman during childbirth and the wild animal which, given the context data, is the adult male red deer. The pivotal personage of the drama, Mother Ranaldi, shares her iconographic canon with the Goddess of Childbirth in prehistoric art. She is a majestic, naked, corpulent and fertile anthropomorph who is delivering a new life between her generous thighs. The depiction of the newborn’s head emerging from the vagina emphasizes her female power to procreate. Mother Ranaldi is birthing flanked by two adult stags which she touches with her sacred hands. They are not ordinary animals. Their supernatural nature is described by three features: exaggerated unnatural antlers, clear epiphanic seasonal nature, and bicephalism. They were symbol of worship to the Goddess of Generation, acting as her <italic>paredri</italic> (supporting, assisting partners). Ranaldi Shelter was used during the seasonal relocation of cervids, which in spring moved from the plains to the summer mountainous ranges. Then, the red paintings had not only a sacred value. Having totemic nature, they carried out a territorial function by contributing to organize and mark the territory, possibly associated with appropriate rituals.
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Mother Ranaldi: a post-paleolithic goddess gives birth flanked by supernatural stags

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>The preventive archaeological researches of 2011 led to sensational discoveries. These include evidence for the extraction of radiocarbon data. We analyze new evidence from the periods: neolithic and eneolithic (Turdaş culture), eneolithic (Petreşti culture) and classical dacian period (1st century AD).</abstract>

Radiocarbon data from the archaeological site of Turdaş-<italic>Luncă</italic> (preventive research of 2011)(IV)

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>In late spring 1398, the noble judges of the Inner Szolnok County rejected John Toth as the legal representative of Stephen I, voivode of Moldavia. Toth (i.e. the Slav/ Slovak, chiefly in later centuries) was in fact merely the procurator of Stephen’s appointed procurator (representative), a certain John, the son of Costea. Mircea I the Elder, the voivode of Wallachia, was experiencing similar legal problems at the time in the Voivodate of Tran-sylvania. In January 1399, his procurator, Nicholas Dobokai of Luduş, the son of Ladislas Dobokai (the relative of Mircea’s step-uncle, Wladislaw I Vlaicu), had to admit he did not know the exact boundaries of the estate of the Hunyad castle, recently granted by Sigismund of Luxemburg to Mircea. The two documents, almost trivial in essence, point towards two neglected issues: the first Transylvanian estates granted by a king of Hungary to a voivode of Moldavia and to the transalpine origins of the Hunyadi family. Placed in the context of other edited and unedited sources (charters and chronicles), the documents in question provide new perspectives on the beginnings and actions of famed Wallachian personalities of the next century.</abstract>

At the Turn of the Fourteenth Century: Sigismund of Luxemburg and the Wallachian Princely “Stars” of the Fifteenth Century

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
In this article we will partially analyze the place of worship consisting of 7 structures discovered following preventive research on the A1 highway, Sibiu – Pitești sector, Part 5, Curtea de Argeș-Pitești. The discoveries are part from site 2, surface 11.
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Some data about an early neolithic worship place

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>After the end of World War I and the creation of Greater Romania, various actors tried to influence the official policy of the state by proposing political visions suitable to consolidate the Romanian identity and character of the country. The Orthodox Church, one of the most vocal of these actors, envisioned a variety of activities and programs with the goal of promoting the future development of the country alongside religious principles. In particular, in 1925 the Metropolitan of Ardeal organized the first “mass” pilgrimage to the Holy Land in the history of the Romanian people. Among the participants was Iosif Trifa, a close collaborator of the Metropolitan and the initiator and organizer of a widespread spiritual movement called the Army of the Lord. During the pilgrimage Trifa wrote notes that later constituted the basis of his travelogue <italic>Pe urmele Mântuitorului</italic> [In the Footsteps of the Savior], a book that, I will suggest, proposes a national – spiritual model for the building of the new political project inspired by the mythical image of the holy places. Trifa vested these pastoral concerns with political preoccupations that ultimately claimed the Holy Land as an ideal pattern for Greater Romania. Through a gradual literary process that morphed Palestine into the Christian Holy Land and reclaimed it for Orthodox Christians only, Trifa established a close connection between the holy sites and Romania by presenting the group of pilgrims and their itinerary as a symbol of the nation walking in the footsteps of Jesus Christ. A close reading of the narrative will show that Trifa aimed at using it as an exhortation to prompt Romanians’ commitment to Orthodoxy as the only successful solution to the national project.</abstract>

The Making of a Holy Nation: Pastoral Activity, Pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and Nationalism in Interwar Romanian Orthodoxy

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The rescue research carried out within the site Olteni - Sand Quarry (Site B), between 2005-2012, highlighted the existence of a settlement with dwelling features belonging to the cultures of Linear Pottery, Boian-Giuleşti and Precucuteni, phase I. In this study we present the anthropomorphic figurines attributed to the early Eneolithic discovered in this site, while discussing also the archaeological and chronological contexts from which they originate
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Up and down. From Inner Curvature to Northern Wallachia and back during the 5th millennium BC

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
Roughly a week before Ali Mihaloğlu, bey of Vidin and Smederevo, raided Oradea (February 7-8, 1474), the royal link between Hungary proper and the Voivodate of Transylvania, the Commune of Ragusa, equally vassal to Ottoman sultan Mehmed II and to Matthias Corvinus, king of Hungary, informed the Venetian doge, Nicolò Marcello, her Adriatic neighbour, about the most recent developments at the Porte, as well as both at the Porte’s Asian and European borders (January 31, 1474). From the latest news on Usun Hassan, still viewed by some as Christendom’s main anti-Ottoman hope (in spite of the crippling losses he had suffered in August 1473), Ragusa moved on – in her message to Venice (earlier Usun’s main supporter) – to the combats in <italic>Vlachia Maior</italic> (Wallachia proper), recently invaded by Stephen III <italic>the Great</italic> of Moldavia (November 8-30, 1473). The information had likewise been provided by the Ragusan envoys to the Porte, who had just returned to the Adriatic, after departing from Constantinople (Istanbul) on December 28, 1473. With Venice waging an increasingly desperate war against Mehmed II (for ten years and counting), the task of conveying Ottoman inside information was very delicate for tribute paying Ragusa.The Ragusan message is the only extant known source to state that Stephen III <italic>the Great</italic> had won Wallachia from Radu III <italic>the Handsome</italic> for the benefit of Vlad III <italic>the Impaller</italic>. The rest of the known sources (however chronicles, not documents) claim that Stephen enthroned Basarab III <italic>Laiotă</italic> as ruler of Wallachia (<italic>Laiotă</italic> was his Wallachian ruler of choice until autumn 1474).Ragusa’s Venetian message bluntly contradicts the known contemporary data on Stephen III’s intervention in Wallachia in November 1473 and on the subsequent events, data preserved only in the chronicles of Stephen III (chiefly in the <italic>Moldavian-German Chronicle</italic> intended for Habsburg subjects, around 1499-1500) and in the writings of Jan Długosz (notoriously hostile towards the Hunyadis).
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The Asian and Balkan Background of <italic>Draculia</italic>’s Wallachian Restoration (1473-1474)

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
For Pope Pius II, Vlad was <italic>John Dragula</italic> and his cruelty completed the lamented fate of the Wallachians, Rome’s Eastern forgotten children, still capable of finding recovery and redemption, Vlad included, under the authority of Matthias, the king of Hungary and of <italic>Dacia</italic> (according to the same pope). Basarab IV, <italic>Cypelles</italic> for Beatrice of Aragon, that is either “Little Impaller” or “Little Shoemaker”, seems to have been quite the opposite, though otherwise his and Vlad’s “career choices” were quite similar: Vlad went from pro-Ottoman to pro-Hungarian, “chosing” West over East, and Basarab turned from pro-Hungarian to pro-Ottoman, inheriting also Mara Branković’s “medial” stand between West and East, that favoured a pro-Ottoman status-quo at the borders of divided Christendom. Their short “joint-rule” over Wallachia, turned into Christendom’s trench by King Matthias, Christendom’s hope, and Stephen of Moldavia, the <italic>athlete</italic> of Christendom, is eloquent for the bi-polar survival of a divided state that gradually came to a – temporary – end once both <italic>Ţepeş</italic> and <italic>Ţepeluş</italic> were gone. This occurred under the rules of Vlad IV <italic>Călugărul</italic>, a former monk, Vlad’s half-brother, and of his son, Radu IV <italic>the Great</italic>, an “agent” of Venice and of the Porte. At that time, the Greek rite Brankovićs were still barons of the realm of Saint Stephen, as well as “registered voters” at the royal Hungarian elections of 1490, the year that stands for both the end of Matthias’ plans and hopes for his son’s monarchic survival and in fact – in early modern Wallachian chronicles – for the end of Stephen III’s <italic>16</italic>/ <italic>17 years</italic> of rule over Wallachia.
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From <italic>Dragula</italic> to <italic>Cypelles</italic>: Wallachia in the Late 1470s

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>The article presents new information regarding the percentual distribution of Starčevo-Criș decorated pottery, using the information on the Early Neolithic discoveries from the sites of Miercurea Sibiului-Petriș (Sibiu County), Turdaș-Luncă (Hunedoara County), Săliștea (Alba County), Cristian I (Sibiu County) and Cristian III (Sibiu County). Excepting Miercurea Sibiului-Petriș and Cristian I sites for which, besides the information about the category, color, temper, surface treatment, firing and morphology of this pottery were published in different volumes or articles, also some data regarding the different percentages on types of ornaments were published. This time, the author discusses globally the total amount of decorated pottery, taking into consideration also the relative chronological framings for each of the sites</abstract>

Between Rudimentary and Artistic: Decorated Starčevo-Criș Pots

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>The preventive excavation from 2011, at Turdaș-Luncă, led to the discovery of over 2000 archaeological features. Among them is feature 959. Through this article we want to continue the series of publications related to the preventive excavation of 2011 and highlight certain aspects related to a possible organization of the communities that lived here.</abstract>

The Central Area of a“ Square” from the Time of Turdaș Culture Turdaș-<italic>Luncă</italic>. 2011 Campaign. Sector C The Architectural Horizon before the great Migration from Turdaș

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>This article resents archaeological discoveries of ritual pits framed in Petrești culture, discovered in western and south-western Transylvania. The ritual of consecrating the dwellings, through banquets dedicated to fertility and fecundity, is so well known at the time around the Apuseni Mountains that is spreads in cultural environments, west of them.</abstract>

Ritual deposits of the Petrești culture in South-Western Transylvania

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