Vladimir Mitev
Table of contents
Summary
- The international conference on the Craiova Treaty explored human stories and the forced population exchange between Bulgaria and Romania.
- Daniel Cain emphasized the significance of discussing sensitive historical topics like Southern Dobruja.
- The conference marked a step towards normalizing historical relations and promoting bilateral cooperation between Romanian and Bulgarian historians.
- Both sides are beginning to overcome biases and work together on joint initiatives to understand their intertwined histories better.
- A volume of the proceedings will showcase the desire for improved relations and a shared understanding of the past.
Intro
On September 19-20, 2025, an international conference dedicated to the Treaty of Craiova and the Dobruja issue was held in Sofia, attended by renowned researchers from Bulgaria, Romania, and Italy. The conference allowed for a free exchange of perspectives and sources, with an emphasis on human stories and the drama of the forced population exchange between Bulgaria and Romania, the diplomacy surrounding the Treaty of Craiova, and the myths associated with it.
In the context of the conference, The Bridge of Friendship spoke with Daniel Cain, a Romanian historian with in-depth knowledge of Romanian-Bulgarian historical topics from the modern period of both states.
Daniel Cain is the director of the Institute for Southeast European Studies of the Romanian Academy. He is also the president of the Romanian part of the Joint Romanian-Bulgarian History Commission. Daniel Cain is a historian specializing in Romanian-Bulgarian relations in the 19th and 20th centuries.
The significance of the conference
Mr. Cain, what is the significance of the conference dedicated to the Treaty of Craiova and the human stories intertwined in Southeast Europe?
It is a significant step, in my view, towards normalizing relations at the historiographical level, because for a long time, Southern Dobruja, the Quadrilater, as it is known in Romania, has been an extremely sensitive topic on the Romanian-Bulgarian historiographical agenda. The subject has been avoided for a long time, for reasons that are more or less explainable. It all has to do with the image of the other, so to speak.
The Quadrilater was a border area and, at the same time, an area where there was a spiral of violence between 1913 and 1940. From this point of view, there is a dissonance, so to speak, in what this space means to the two peoples. For Romanians, the Quadrilater is linked to the idyllic image of Queen Maria and the castle in Balchik. For many Bulgarians, especially those in the Dobruja area, the memory of Romanian administration does not arouse much sympathy, to use a euphemism. It was a rather difficult period, and certain resentments have been passed down from generation to generation. At the local level, there are still remnants of this sensitivity towards a tragic episode in the history of this area, I am referring here to Southern Dobruja, the Quadrilater.
The historiographical approach and the maturity of societies
If, until now, relatively few researchers have dealt with the subject of Dobruja and the Treaty of Craiova, to what extent does this conference show that both states, researchers, and perhaps even societies are more prepared to discuss and be open to each other’s opinions and information?
The fact that such a conference could be organized in Sofia, with the presence of Romanian and Bulgarian historians and an Italian colleague, all with expertise in the Dobruja region, can only be an indication of the normalization of the approach to this subject in our common history.
Being neighbors in the Balkans sometimes has certain drawbacks. What is important is how we relate to this shared experience. After all, our generation views things with more detachment, for the simple reason that we were not part of the events that took place in Dobruja a century ago. This can also be an impetus for action. We need to have as many joint initiatives as possible because, as two neighboring countries, sooner or later, many things intersect from a historiographical point of view. There are influences on both sides that we need to analyze and contextualize in order to better understand what happened in the interwar period and to draw some conclusions. Ultimately, the role of historians is not only to show what happened, but also to try to offer some lessons from these historical events.
Impact on human stories
Your presentation was related to human stories that cannot easily be framed within the state ideology of either of the two countries. It has already been 85 years since Romania and Bulgaria resolved the issue of Dobruja. But to what extent have the people living in the Dobruja area, on both sides, managed to resolve their personal stories over time?
Time solves everything. There is a generational change. At the same time, there is a memory of the things that happened during the period when the Quadrilater was part of the Romanian state. This period is stored in the collective memory of the local population, not everyone, but it is sometimes passed down from generation to generation. There is also a certain local patriotism, which is sometimes used for political purposes. I am referring here to domestic politics, to political life in Bulgaria. But the events of the last few years have led to a blurring of this memory in terms of criticism of the Romanian state and the Romanian presence in the Quadrilater.
For Romanians, as I said, Balchik is a tourist destination. It represents a romantic image, linked both to the memory of Queen Maria and to the cultural life that developed in Balchik in the 1920s and 1930s. Ultimately, however, this tragic history has also given rise to things that connect us, not just divide us. This was also the reason why I tried to identify, in the documents kept in the Diplomatic Archives of the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the stories of people who were, so to speak, caught up in the times. We must bear in mind that at the end of 1940, some 160,000 people were forced to give up their property and move. We are talking about approximately 100,000 Romanian citizens who moved from the Quadrilateral to the Romanian Kingdom, and from Northern Dobruja, another 63,000 people were forced to move to Bulgaria. It is a tragic story of those times, which were themselves very tragic, including for the history of the Romanian state. I am referring to 1940, a dark year in the history of Romania.
But, on the other hand, it is still a subject that deserves to be researched. I emphasize the importance of the conference organized in Sofia, because it is the first time since 1990 that it has been possible to discuss the history of Southern Dobruja. An international conference was organized, attended by historians from both countries. Until now, there has been a reluctance to address the subject because of the passions it arouses. I believe that we have now reached a certain maturity in which we can move beyond the stereotypes of the other, an image constructed only in critical moments of our shared history, without actually contextualizing and trying to understand much better the period and how the rulers of that time, but also international politics, affected the destinies of people who were not at fault, because they were born on one side or the other of the Danube, or for the simple reason that they were born with Romanian or Bulgarian citizenship. Overall, I must say that this conference represents a foundation that we have managed to lay for future bilateral cooperation projects on this subject. Fortunately, there is a rich collaboration between Romanian and Bulgarian historians in bilateral projects, carried out mainly through the two academies and, of course, within other European projects. However, the topics discussed so far have not been strictly limited to this extremely sensitive episode, namely the history of the Quadrilateral during the Romanian administration.
Relations between historians and the future of collaboration
During the conference, both in the official and informal parts, I saw what I consider to be a very good relationship between Romanian and Bulgarian historians. What is happening between the current Romanian historians researching Bulgaria and those in Bulgaria researching the history of Romania?
Until now, there has been a certain majority trend in which each side has tried to stick to its own point of view, largely ignoring the other’s point of view. There has been this trap of approaching history from a strictly national perspective, with its pros and cons. Probably because of the language barrier, this approach was chosen, without access to a bibliography that would also present the other side’s point of view. Because, ultimately, things look different if the angle of approach is different. I am confident that, given the atmosphere during this international conference, good things will happen in the coming period in terms of bilateral relations. First of all, there will be a volume with the proceedings of this international conference, published in an internationally used language. However, it will be seen that there is a willingness to overcome the burdens of the past and to enter into a rhetoric that is not necessarily normal, but a European rhetoric that takes into account the context in which we find ourselves and this need to understand each other much better. This also requires knowledge of each other’s culture, civilization, and history, as well as the need to engage in dialogue on topics that, I repeat, are somewhat sensitive.
Photo: Daniel Cain (source: YouTube)
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