~28 mm diameter, ~10 g, bronze inside a square PARA (Romanian currency), horizontal line and 3 DENGHY (Russian Currency), all in Cyrillic letters	heraldicly corrupt Coats of Arms of Moldavia (left) and of Walachia (right) united under a crown, Russian legend MON. MOLD: I VALOSK. (in Cyrillic), meaning MOLDAVIAN AND WALACHIAN COIN, year 1772

The images of the coin above are present on the site by courtesy of an anonymous donor.

About the coins struck at Sadagura

This piece and the following were struck by the Russian army during the war between the Otoman Empire and Russia waged between 1768 and 1774. Empress Catherine (Ecaterina) II endowed her army with a round budget for this war and a mint, but DID NOT provide the silver or other precious metal for striking. This led to the issue of these two bronze coins the value of which was not covered by anything and which were imposed to the Romanian population for products. The value is double: first the currency is expressed in paras, small Turkish coins that circulated along many other European currencies in the Romanian Principalities, and then in denghy or kopieky, Russian currencies. This Russian custom applied to the countries that were already or about to be conquered - double legend and double face value coins were struck by Russia for Poland, Finland and Georgia at least, for other countries also, perhaps. Interesting to notice, no other coins were ever struck for TWO countries at the same time: watch the obverse legend that says "Moldavian and Walachian coin". There are also two coats of arms. Moldavia and Walachia of the time were bound by common heritage, language, religion and Otoman suzerainty - nevertheless, they were different countries. The fact is that Ecaterina II knew that the Principalities were populated by Romanians and had a plan to unite the two into a "Dacian Kingdom" that should have been given to her son.

The coins were struck at Sadagura near the town of Cernăuţi, in northern Moldavia. The bronze of the coins is that bad that you can hardly find now a piece in decent condition.

28.8 mm diameter, 10.3 g, bronze

About the Russian-Turkish War between 1768-1774

Officially, the war began on the 30th of October 1768, when the Porte declared war to Russia. On the 16th of November 1769 Romanian voluntaries led by Ilie Lăpuşneanu seized the city of Bucharest by means of surprise. The same day the Russian attack over the city of Giurgiu failed to succeed. On the 1st of December 1769 the prince of Moldavia, Constantin Mavrocordat, was captured by the Russians in the Danubian and border Moldavian city of Galaţi, dying just three days afterwards in the capital city of la Iaşi. On July 7th and 21st 1770 the Russian armies (that had Romanian voluntaries in their midst) achieve victories over the Turks at Larga and Cahul. Between July 1772 and March 1773 the cities of Focşani and Bucharest hosted negotiations aimed at signing a peace treaty. Peace was finally signed on the 10th of July 1774, through the Russian-Ottoman treaty of Kuciuk-Kainargi (place in the nowadays Bulgaria). The Principalities were exempt of the tribute for two years. Between September 27th 1769 and September 1774 Moldavia was under Russian military occupation, and so was Walachia between November 1769 and July 1774. As a consequence of this war, following the Turkish-Austrian convention of May 7th 1775 Austria despoiled Moldavia of the historical territories of Cernăuţi and Suceava (to the north), known afterwards as Bucovina (denomination made up by the occcupants), territories that should have been protected by the Ottoman Empire along the rest of the national land accordingly to all capitulation conditions in the past and impossible of being conceded by anyone except their rightful owner. Worth mentioning is that the Turks on site negotiator fooled the Gate into convincing it there was just a small passage between Transylvania and Galicia.

In the region thus forcibly taken the most important sanctuary of the Romanians lay, id est the tomb of prince Stephen the Great and the Holy from Putna Monastery.

The regions of Cernăuţi and Suceava remained Austrian until 1918 when they returned to Romania as natural and most important parts of northern Moldavia. The region of Cernăuţi was taken by force in 1940 by the Soviet Union as result of a militarily enforced and peremtory ultimatum demand and did not return to the HomeLand ever after. It is now a part of Ukraine along other parts of Moldavia, separated in 1812.

28 mm diameter, 10.05 g, bronze
28.8 mm diameter, 10 g, bronze