Augustin Bunea

Bunea's early interest as a historian lay mainly with the history of the Romanian Greek-Catholic Church. His first book, a short volume from 1890, deals with the church's present condition. First appearing in Foaia bisericească și scolastică, and then as a 40-page brochure, it includes biographical information about incumbent metropolitan Vancea, as well as cataloguing his cultural, administrative and philanthropic activity. Bunea's 1893 work Cestiuni din dreptul și istoria Bisericii Românești Unite. Partea a II-a also deals with a contemporary issue. The author argued in defense of the church's autonomy, which was being threatened by the policies of the Hungarian government.^[3]

In 1900, Bunea published two books: Istoria scurtă a Bisericii Române Unite, a brief history of the church; and an important monograph about Inocențiu Micu-Klein. The first, written on the 200th anniversary of the union with Rome, began with an overview of relations between Romanians and the Holy See from the 2nd to the 15th centuries, going on to discuss Transylvania's Romanian church under the Calvinist princes. He then described the union itself and the life and activity of the early bishops in each diocese, ending with the present day. Bunea's sources were either published Latin and Romanian books or documents he researched in the metropolitan archive at Blaj.^[3] It is possible that the work inspired Zenovie Pâclișanu, whose later history of the church features a similar structure.^[6]

His study of Micu-Klein, which also touched on Petru Pavel Aron and Dionisije Novaković, delved into the problems of the 18th century's first half, reconstructing the facts based on numerous sources collected from Transylvanian and foreign archives. It appears that Bunea began preparation as early as 1894, when he received several copies of documents from the Vienna imperial court's archive. The book demonstrates thorough research on the social, political and cultural history of the Romanians in that era. Later exegeses by Pâclișanu, I. Tóth Zoltán and David Prodan used it as a basis for further research into contemporary Romanian life in Transylvania.^[7]

The 1902 Istoria românilor transilvăneni de la 1751 până la 1764 is similarly ample in depth. The preface speaks of the author's purpose: to advance the community's national development and to present his own concept of history. It deals with the figure of Aron; the question of Romanian religious movements, which is allocated considerable space; the organization of his church and of the Romanian Orthodox Church; the founding and development of Blaj's schools; the history of Transylvanian monasteries; the evolution of printing among the province's Romanians; and the political, economic and social situation of the peasantry. He pinpoints two important processes that took place in the history of Transylvanian Romanians during the period analyzed: their confessional disunity and the founding of the Blaj schools. While he opined that the first was in the interests of their neighboring political adversaries, he saw the second as elevating Micu-Klein above all other Romanians of the period. The book is based mainly on unpublished documents gathered from institutional archives in Blaj, Sibiu, Făgăraș, Vienna, Budapest and Rome, as well as from a few private individuals in Transylvania and the Romanian Old Kingdom. Some 250 documents were reproduced in the footnotes and appendices. He also used texts published by Timotei Cipariu, Iorga and Sterie Stinghe. During the interwar period, the topics broached by Bunea were taken up by the Cluj historical school.^[7]

Subsequently, Bunea became more interested in the history of the Orthodox Church in Transylvania, its origins, organizational and institutional evolution. A first work in this direction, published in 1902, was Vechile episcopii românesci a Vadului, Geoagiului, Silvașului și Bĕlgradului. The following year, he amplified and corrected certain conclusions in Istoria autonomiei bisericești, where he frequently cited Cipariu, George Bariț, Eudoxiu Hurmuzachi and Nikolaus Nilles. His next two books dealt with similar issues, and were written in response to polemics by contemporary Orthodox writers.^[7]

Ierarhia românilor din Ardeal și Ungaria (1904) is Bunea's reply to Teodor Păcățian's Istoriografi vechi, istoriografi noi. Studiu critic în chestia vechei mitropolii române.^[8] The latter work, a response to Vechile episcopii românesci, attempted to demonstrate the existence of a Romanian Orthodox metropolis in medieval Transylvania. Bunea, analyzing the church's institutional organization, reiterated that there was no documentary evidence of such an organization. The book displays a biting critique of Păcățian's way of writing history. It also elucidates his theory and approach to the practice: his knowledge of Latin, Hungarian and German allowed Bunea to use valuable historical information in order to complete what he found in Romanian sources, and to broaden his horizon when understanding the historical facts of the region. This made him an authority in debates on ecclesiastical history the western part of the Romanian-speaking lands. The second book, also a polemic, was the 1906 Mitropolitul Sava Brancovici. In his previous work, Bunea had already presented data about the life and activity of Sava Branković. The new text featured a detailed analysis of a book with the same title by Vasile Mangra and reached contrasting conclusions about Branković's place in church history. As with Păcățian, Bunea questioned Mangra's competence as a historian.^[9]

Bunea's final studies, which have to do with medieval Romanian history, were left incomplete at the time of his death. At the Romanian Academy's request, they were published posthumously as Stăpânii Țării Oltului, which he had prepared as his maiden speech to the Academy; and Încercare de istoria Românilor până la 1382. He chose to analyze the historic importance of Țara Oltului (another name for Țara Făgărașului) because of its role in the origins of the foundation of Wallachia and the consolidation of the Romanian element through longstanding ties with the latter region. The theme also had an emotional resonance: as Bianu inferred, it represented "the country of his parents and his birth". The work comprises a succinct political history of the area from the 9th through the 18th centuries, describing its status and leaders, specifying the political implications of leadership for each of them.^[9]

Beginning with the year 895, the author highlights the arrival of the Magyars in Pannonia and especially Transylvania; fixes the geographic limits of Țara Oltului; specifies its Romanian character, drawing on toponymy and the first Hungarian documents; credits the tradition that Radu Negru of Făgăraș was responsible for the foundation, which took place at Câmpulung and Curtea de Argeș; presents historical information about the region and its Romanian inhabitants over the course of the 13th century and into the first half of the 14th; details offensives launched by the Kingdom of Hungary to the east and south of the Carpathian Mountains during the same period; enumerates nine Romanian lords who possessed Țara Oltului, from Vladislav I to Vlad III; summarized their political relations with the suzerain power; listed the leaders from Vlad to Sigismund Báthory; noted the role of the Romanian Mailat family, and the political implications of controlling the region; briefly listed its property owners from the 17th century, drawing on fiscal records; and ended with 1713, when the Făgăraș domain passed to the state.^[9]

Bunea deliberately focuses on the intervals of Romanian domination. He speaks appreciatively of the historiographic achievements of Iorga, Onciul and János Karácsonyi; the text follows the direction set by the leading members of the Romanian critical school, Iorga, Onciul and Ioan Bogdan.^[9] However, at times, he expresses disagreement with other historians' opinions, advancing his own historiographic solutions in the same context.^[10] He insistently draws upon the document collections of Hurmuzachi; and among Hungarian historians, he prefers Karácsonyi, Frigyes Pesty and Gyula Pauler. An abundantly documented work, its bibliography features over 80 titles in Romanian, Hungarian, German and Latin; there are 225 footnotes, some shorter, others lengthy.^[4]

As to Încercare de istoria...., the manuscript was analyzed by Onciul at the Academy's request. He found that the contents mainly dealt with church history and, tangentially, with political history and ethnography. Although it remained unfinished, Onciul recommended publication, both in order to make Bunea's findings known and as an homage. He also began a vast work about the Romanian regiments in the Transylvanian Military Frontier. Although he did not live to complete it, he did gather rich material on the subject. His archive includes numerous documents, both copies and originals, in Latin, Hungarian and German, about the border regiments.^[4]

• (in Romanian) Fănică Niță, "Augustin Bunea, istoric: preliminarii", in Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Historica, nr. 7/2003, pp. 329–36