There is a saying that countries know no
\nfriends, only their own interests. But history has proved this oversimplifying
\nstatement to be wrong. The past is filled with examples of friendly relations
\nbetween countries that translated into military alliances, marriage
\narrangements or the entrustment of secrets and assets. There are quite a number
\nof cases where a country has entrusted its own treasure for safekeeping to
\nanother country, in an attempt to prevent its most cherished assets from
\nfalling into the enemy’s hands. Such was the case of the Polish treasure hosted
\nby Romania in September 1939, at a time when Poland was attacked by both Nazi
\nGermany and the Soviet Union. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
But alliances, just as friendships, can be
\ndeceptive. During the Great War, Romania joined the Entente made up of France,
\nEngland and Russia. In the name of the friendly relation between the two
\nstates, Romania’s treasure was transported to Moscow lest it should be seized
\nby the German troops that occupied Bucharest and most of southern Romania in
\nDecember 1916. Over December 12-14, some 1738 crates were loaded into 17
\ncarriages in the railway station in Iasi, northern Romania. The crates
\ncontained Romania’s gold deposits, comprising both ingots and various coins.
\nIts approximate value at the time was 315 million gold lei. Another two crates
\ncontained the personal jewels of Queen Marie, estimated at 7 million gold lei.
\nThe transport reached Moscow on December 21, 1916. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
A second shipment was made in summer the next
\nyear. Three train carriages were loaded with the assets of the National Bank of
\nRomania, in the amount of 1.6 billion lei, of which the gold itself accounted
\nfor 575,000 lei, the archives were put at 500,000 lei, while the remaining
\n75,000 were bonds, assets, deposits and other valuable goods. Another 21
\ncarriages contained 1,661 boxes with the assets of the House of Deposits, worth
\n7.5 billion lei. The second shipment reached Moscow on the 3rd of August
\n1917 and also contained other private assets and art collections meant to be
\nstored in the Kremlin. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Historian Ioan Scurtu says the loss suffered by
\nRomania with the departure of its treasures to Russia is hard to estimate:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Romania lost at that time the treasure of the
\nNational Bank that ensured the normal circulation of money across Romania.
\nApart from the National Bank treasure, there were many other assets that much
\nexceeded the value of this treasure, consisting in 93 tonnes of gold ingots. There
\nwere art objects, paintings, religious objects, carpets and other artefacts of
\nhistorical and sentimental value. I don’t even believe one can make an
\nestimation of how much the Romanian treasure was worth in any national
\ncurrency, whether lei, dollars or rubles, because some of the pieces are very
\ndifficult to evaluate. How can you evaluate, for example, a baptismal font from
\nthe 15th century? Its artistic value alone, the craftsmanship,
\nexceeds the value of the metal of which it is made. Romania is poorer for
\nlosing this treasure, for trusting that it will be returned to it based on the
\nword of civilised nations that have respect for international law.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The Bolshevik revolution led to the severance
\nof diplomatic ties between Romania and Russia in January 1918, at Lenin’s
\ninitiative, in a diplomatic letter addressed to the Romanian government. It was
\nstated in this letter that Romania’s treasure would remain in Russia to be
\ndenied to the Romanian oligarchy and to be one day returned to the working people.
\nWe asked historian Ioan Scurtu whether Romania’s government at the time didn’t
\nhave a better option than to send the country’s treasure to Russia:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
There was the idea of sending the treasure to
\nSweden, where it would have been safer, but transportation was a problem. How
\ncould we have sent it to Sweden without the German troops capturing it? We have
\nthe benefit of hindsight so we can say now that it was a mistake to send the
\ntreasure to Russia. But I don’t think we can say the same thing if we try to look
\nat it from the point of view of those who made this decision back then. I would
\nalso like to point out that there was a general obsession, in 1917, that
\nMoldavia would be occupied. Many MPs had already left Iasi and had taken refuge
\nin Odessa. There were even suggestions that the Cabinet itself ought to leave
\nthe city of Iasi, and King Ferdinand and Bratianu had to talk the ministers
\ninto staying. The government as a whole shared that obsession; there are
\naccounts of the scope of that psychosis. As the Liberal politician I. G. Duca
\nexplained, the trains were already loaded and there were people bringing in
\nmore and more cases with items to be put on the trains to Moscow, from where
\nthey were supposed to be recovered after the war. The government shared that
\nobsession and there was no way of predicting what was about to happen, namely
\nthat Russia would not keep its promise.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
At the end of the war, the Romanian diplomacy
\nrepeatedly initiated negotiations to recover the treasure. In 1935, the USSR
\nreturned the archives and the documents of the Romanian Academy, and in 1956 it
\ndecided to return a small part of the gold, the most notable item of which was
\nthe Pietroasele treasure, dubbed the Hen with Golden Chicks. Although in July
\n2003, when a bilateral treaty was signed by Romania and the Russian Federation,
\nthe issue of the treasure was scheduled to be discussed, a solution is yet to
\nbe found. One hundred years on, the Romanian treasure is still in Moscow, a
\nprisoner of a disloyal friendship.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There is a saying that countries know no friends, only their own interests. But history has proved this oversimplifying statement to be wrong.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":129148,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41141],"tags":[42675],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-129800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-history-show","tag-romanian-treasure"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n