Back
to Homepage Annuario 2002
p. 356
Documents regarding the History
of the Italian Legation in Bucharest
1879-1914
Romanian Institute of
Humanist
Culture and Research, Venice
The establishment of an
Italian legation in Bucharest took place on December 16/18, 1879, when the
first extraordinary envoy and plenipotentiary minister was accredited, in the
person of the Count Giuseppe Tornielli-Brusati di Vergano[1].
The documents presented in this article – collected from different fonds of the
Historical-Diplomatic Archive of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs –
refer to various respects of the evolution and activity of the Italian Legation
in Romania, respectively of the diplomatic personnel in the period between 1879
and 1914. The first group gathers a series of fragments selected from the diary
in manuscript of Alberto Pansa (1844-1923), Italian diplomat, accredited to
Bucharest between May 20 and November 13, 1879 and in 1881-1883. Admitted in
the diplomatic career on February 1965, Pansa worked in the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs’ central office by 1877, also as secretary of Emilio Visconti Venosta,
to whom school he was trained. Subsequently, he was successively named as
Legation First Secretary in Athens, Belgrade, Bucharest, Constantinople,
General Consul in Budapest (1886-1889), Plenipotentiary Minister in Peking
(1889-1894), Agent and General Consul in Cairo (1894-1895), Ambassador in
Constantinople (1895-1901), London (1901-1906) and finally in Berlin
(1906-1912)[2]. He was
first time directed to Bucharest on May 1879, as Chargé d’Affaires and
having the task – finally not accomplished – to notify the recognition of the
Romanian Principality’s independence by the Italian government[3].
He came back to Bucharest between September 12-June 14, 1883 as Legation First
Secretary. The Italian diplomat’s diaries are usually of small size, extremely
laconic, speaking only about the essence of different events and situations.
The notes in 1879, the year of his first contact with the Romanian space and
realities, are especially interesting. Unfortunately, the political information
is seldom and does not take into consideration the Italian-Romanian bilateral
relationship or the respects regarding the political activity promoted by the
Italian Legation in Bucharest. On the contrary, in his notes, there are to be
observed, because of his travels, depictions of the different settlements
(Bucharest, Sinaia, Jassy, Galaþi, Constanþa, Giurgiu) and regions (Bessarabia,
Dobroudja) of the small Romanian Principality, and also summary characterizations
of some personalities in the region, different respects concerning the
material, social and of high society Bucharest life in the period,
considerations of the contemporaneous mentalities, etc.
p. 357
Excepting
the documents referring to the achievement of the Legation’s palace, the second
part of the material gathers especially exchange of letters, official or
private, sent towards different decisional factors in the Italian Ministry of
Foreign Affairs by the Legation’s third titular, that is Carlo Emanuele
Beccaria d’Incisa (1846-1923), accredited to Bucharest as extraordinary envoy
and plenipotentiary minister between May 23, 1895 and July 10, 1911[4].
The matters approached are generally of administrative feature: the Legation’s
logistic, evolutions and characterizations of the personell, the manner and the
quantity of the activity of chancellery, the features of the space and of the
society that the representation activity takes place in, etc. Nevertheless, the
political[5],
economic and other different information is not lacking, some of them referring
to respects of the Italian presence in Romania, superficially or totally
unknown. In this sense, there are to be noted, for instance, the referrals of
the Minister Beccaria to the activity of assistance and care of the Italian
emigration, temporary or permanent, promoted by the Legation in Bucharest in
the period previous to the First World War.
The
originals of the documents are detectable in Archivio Storico Diplomatico del Ministero degli Affari Esteri, Roma
[ASDMAE]. The fonds that they belong
to are mentioned in the text separately for each document. All the
interruptions in the diplomat Alberto Pansa’s diary are marked by dots; the
ones between brackets indicate the deletion of some days or months.
For this material, permission is granted
for electronic copying, distribution in print form for educational purposes and
personal use.
Whether you intend to utilize it in
scientific purposes, indicate the source: either this web address or the Annuario.
Istituto Romeno di cultura e ricerca umanistica 4 (2002), edited by ªerban
Marin, Rudolf Dinu and Ion Bulei, Venice, 2002
No permission is granted for commercial
use.
© ªerban Marin, August 2002, Bucharest,
Romania
Back to
Homepage Annuario 2002
[1] Cf. Rudolf Dinu, “Note e documenti riguardanti la
storia della Legazione italiana a Bucarest, 1879-1914”, Annuario dell’Istituto Romeno di Cultura e Ricerca Umanistica di
Venezia 3 (2001): 222-295.
[2] Cf. La formazione della diplomazia nazionale
(1861-1915). Repertorio bio-bibliografico dei funzionari del Ministero degli
Affari Esteri (a cura di Fabio Grassi),
Rome: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato, 1987: 554-555.
[3] About this
matter, see Dinu, loc. cit.: 230-31.
[4] For his
evolution in the diplomatic career, see La
formazione… Repertorio: 63-64. Summary referals to the Italian diplomat’s
personality, in Glauco Licata, Notabili della terza Italia: In appendice
carte di Salvago Raggi e altri inediti, Rome: Edizioni Cinque Lune, 1968:
279; Dinu, loc. cit.: 260; Antony di
Iorio, “Italy and Rumania in 1914: The Italian Assessment of the
Rumanian Situation, 1907 to 1914”, in Rumanian
Studies, Leiden, 1976-1979: IV, 128.
[5] For the
Romanian-Italian political-diplomatic relationship, see Dinu, “Romanian-Italian Relationship Inside of the
Triple Alliance. The 1888 Agreement”, Annuario
dell'Istituto Rumeno di Cultura e Ricerca Umanistica di Venezia 2 (2000):
175-224.