Union of Transylvania with Romania

• August 17, 1916: Romania signed a secret treaty with the Entente Powers (United Kingdom, France, Italy and Russia), according to which Transylvania, Banat, and Partium would become part of Romania after World War I if the country entered the war. The planned border followed a line some 20-40 kilometres west of the present Hungarian-Romanian border, but joined river Tisza in the South, thus granting the whole of Banat to Romania.
• August 27, 1916: Romania attacks Austria–Hungary. The offensive is soon halted by Austro–Hungarian and German forces. In return, with a combined push from Transylvania and from Bulgaria, the Central Powers occupy Wallachia, including Bucharest. The Romanian capital temporarily moves to Iași.
• December 1916: The German offensive is stopped along the Mărășești–Galați line.
• December 6, 1916: The capital city, Bucharest, was captured by the Central Powers, which now controlled two-thirds of the territory of Romania.
• December 8, 1916: German General August von Mackensen was appointed as the military governor of the occupied territories of Romania.
• May–July 1917: Romanian troops halt a German offensive and push them back to the last trench line, but lose the momentum.
• December 9, 1917: Romania signs an armistice with the Central Powers.
• January 1918: US President Woodrow Wilson condemns any secret treaties and requests autonomy for the ethnic groups of Austria–Hungary.
• March 26–28, 1918: A Congress of Nationalities of Austria-Hungary takes place in Rome. A motion is passed, demanding the recognition of the right of each nation to constitute into a national state, which would stay independent, or would unite with its already existing national state.
• April 9 [O.S. March 27] 1918: Bessarabia, after a three-month independence from Russia, proclaims the Union with the Kingdom of Romania. Romanian and some minority deputies (86 in total) vote for, while the majority of the minorities' (Ukrainian, Russian, German, Jewish, Gagauz) representatives (36 in total) abstain. Two Ukrainian and one Bulgarian deputies (three in total) vote against. The declaration is co-signed by the (pro-German) prime-minister Alexandru Marghiloman for the Romanian government.
• May 18 [O.S. May 5] 1918: A peace treaty is signed between the Central Powers (Germany, Austria–Hungary and Bulgaria) and the Kingdom of Romania, to replace the five-month-old armistice. Romania recovers its pre-war territory occupied by the Central Powers in December 1916, except for Dobruja and the mountain regions. The treaty is not ratified by Romania, in the hope that the tide of the war would turn the other way. The Central Powers, in accordance to the treaty, begin to pull out its troops from occupied Wallachia.
• August 24, 1918: A National Council of Romanian Unity is created in Paris, with Take Ionescu as president, Vasile Lucaciu, Octavian Goga, Dr. Constantin Angelescu and Ioan Theodor Florescu as members. It is recognized as "the exponent of the interests of the Romanian nation of Austria-Hungary" by France (September 29), the United States (October 23), the United Kingdom (October 29), and Italy (November 9), the four powers of the Entente.
• September 2, 1918: A Congress of Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Romanians, Serbs, Croatians, and Ruthenes of Austria-Hungary takes place in New York City. A resolution demanding the division of Austria–Hungary and the liberation of its peoples is passed.
• October 12, 1918: The Executive Committee of the Romanian National Party, the major party in Transylvania representing Romanians in the Kingdom of Hungary, takes place in Nagyvárad (Oradea). A declaration is passed, demanding the creation "in virtue of the national right of every nation to decide its own fate" of a Central National Romanian Council, a provisional governing body for Transylvania. To this end the Romanian National Party forms an Action Committee, seated in Arad, and presided by Vasile Goldiș.
• October 18, 1918:
  • Alexandru Vaida-Voevod, the preeminent Romanian politician in Austria–Hungary, reads the above Declaration of Self-determination in the Parliament of the Hungarian part of Austria–Hungary in Budapest.
  • Emperor Charles I of Austria puts forward a "Manifesto to my faithful peoples", about the reorganization of Austria–Hungary into a federation of six independent states: Austrian, Hungarian, Czech, Yugoslav, Polish, and Ukrainian. The Manifesto fails to achieve its goal, being regarded as a step that comes way too late. National Councils spring up throughout Austria–Hungary, and prefer to negotiate directly with the Entente powers, rather than with the failing Central Government.
  • A reply to Charles' manifesto is passed by the Corps of the Transylvanian and Bukovinian Volunteers in the Austrian-Hungarian Army, which calls for a union of the territories inhabited by Romanians with the Kingdom of Romania. Iuliu Maniu, a preeminent Transylvanian politician, gathers in Vienna 70,000 Transylvanian soldiers from the Austrian-Hungarian Army, and takes them to Transylvania.
• October 23, 1918: Rudolf Brandsch, a Saxon representative in the Hungarian parliament in his speech declared the adherence to the territorial integrity of Hungary, outlining in case other minorities would be granted privileges the Saxon community do not bear, it should be equalized and the rights of the Germans of Hungary should continue to be respected in the future as well.[2]
• October 31, 1918: A new government, led by Károlyi Mihály is formed in Budapest, with the democrat Oszkár Jászi as Minister of Nationalities. The Hungarian government terminates its union with Austria, officially dissolving the Austro-Hungarian state.
• November 3, 1918:
  • General Weber, on behalf of Austria–Hungary, signs the armistice treaty in Padua, Italy.
  • The Central National Romanian Council is created from representatives of the Romanian National Party and those of Social-Democrat Party of Transylvania, and takes control over the local authorities in Transylvania. The Hungarians administrative apparatus disintegrates. Károlyi Mihály's Hungarian government enters negotiations with the Central National Romanian Council.
• November 6 [O.S. October 24] 1918: As the Entente's victory on the Western Front seems more and more likely, and as the Army of General Maurice Sarrail from Salonica breaks through the Bulgarian lines on the Balkan Front, the Romanian pro-German government of Alexandru Marghiloman resigns. A new government, with General Constantin Coandă as Prime Minister, is formed. The general mobilization is decreed.
• November 10 [O.S. October 28] 1918: Romania re-declares war on the Central Powers.
• November 9, 1918: The Romanian National Council sent a memorandum to Budapest demanding the handover of Eastern Hungary (besides the historical Transylvania the counties of Torontál, Temes, Krassó Szörény, Arad, Bihar, Szilágy, Szatmár and Máramaros).[3]
• November 12, 1918: The first Romanian troops enter Hungary and occupy the Gyergyótölgyes (Tulgheș) mountain pass accessing the Székely Land Region.
• November 13, 1918: An Armistice on the Balkan Front is signed in Belgrade, Serbia, between the French General Franchet d'Esperey, chief of the Entente's Oriental Army, and the Hungarian government. Small-scale military action continues for a few days in southern Hungary. The agreement fixes demarcation lines between Hungary, Serbia and Romania, according to which the region of Banat goes under Serbian administration, in spite of the 1916 secret treaty with Bucharest. Körösvidék (Crișana) and Máramaros (Maramureș), including the cities of Szatmárnémeti (Satu Mare), Nagyvárad (Oradea), Belényes (Beiuș), and Arad, as well as the inner Transylvania up to the river Maros (Mureș), are left under Hungarian administration. Hungary is required by the Entente Powers to allow Romanian troops to enter the Transylvanian territories east of the demarcation line along Mureș. Hungary is allowed to keep only eight army divisions. Disarmed troops are returning home.
• November 13–15, 1918: Negotiations are held in Arad between the Hungarian government of Károlyi Mihály and the Central National Romanian Council (of Transylvania), without reaching any agreement. News about the Belgrade agreement reach the Romanian (Transylvanian) delegation. The Central National Romanian Council retreats from negotiations and decides to hold elections and convey for November 18/December 1 the National Assembly of Romanians from Transylvania and Hungary, and to hand power to the latter.
• November 13–20, 1918: Romanian troops occupy further major mountain passes on the northeastern border of Hungary. They have the intent to occupy up about a quarter of the territory of Transylvania, as allotted by the November 13 armistice in Belgrade to pass under its temporary administration. Hungary pulls out troops to comply with the armistice treaty. Isolated armed clashes with the Hungarian military police occur.
• November 1918: During a 12-day interval, elections are held for the National Assembly of Romanians of Transylvania and Hungary. Its 1,228 members are elected 5 each from the electoral districts established in 1910 (600 members in total), and 628 to represent different social, professional and cultural organizations (clergy, teachers' unions, military). The local enthusiasm gains momentum, as demands such as land reform, universal vote, and possible union with Romania are put forward.
• November 25, 1918: The Romanian Army occupies Marosvásárhely (Târgu-Mureș), the most important town of Székely Land, in eastern Transylvania.
• November 25, 1918: The General Council of the Saxons in Nagyszeben (Sibiu) decided in question of Transylvania to choose clear neutrality, without committing themselves either to the Hungarian or the Romanian side.[2]
• November 28, 1918: The National Assembly of Székelys in Marosvásárhely (Târgu-Mureș) reaffirms their support to the territorial integrity of Hungary.
• November 28, 1918: The elected 100-member General Congress of Bukovina passes a resolution of unconditional union with the Kingdom of Romania. Deputies speaking Romanian (74), German (7) and Polish (6) vote for, while the 13 Ukrainian deputies leave before the final vote.

The Great National Assembly of Alba Iulia (December 1, 1918)

First page of Transilvania newspaper from December 1918, referring to the event

On December 1, 1918 (N.S., November 18 O.S.), the National Assembly of Romanians of Transylvania and Hungary, consisting of 1,228 elected representatives of Romanians in Transylvania, Banat, Crișana and Maramureș, convened in Alba Iulia and decreed (by unanimous vote):

the unification of those Romanians and of all the territories inhabited by them with Romania.

The declaration included 26 counties of the Kingdom of Hungary.[4]

The Resolution[5] voted by the National Assembly stipulated also the "fundamental principles for the foundation of the new Romanian State":

• Full national freedom for all the co-inhabiting peoples. Each people will study, manage and judge in its own language by individual of its own stock and each people will get the right to be represented in the law bodies and to govern the country in accordance with the number of its people.
• Equal rights and full autonomous religious freedom for all the religions in the State.
• Full democratic system in all the realms of public life. Suffrage universal, direct, equal, secret, in each commune, proportionally, for both sexes, 21 years old at the representation in communes, counties or parliament.
• Full freedom of the press, association and meeting, free propaganda of all human thoughts.
• Radical agrarian reform. All the assets, above all the big ones, will be inscribed. The wills by which the heir consigns the land to a third party will be abolished; meanwhile, on the basis of the right to cut down estates freely, the peasant will be able to his own property (ploughing land, pasture, forest), at least one for him and his family to labour on. The guiding principle of this agrarian policy is promoting social evening, on the one hand, and giving force to production, on the other.
• The industrial workers will be granted the same rights and privileges that are in force in the most advanced western industrial states.

The union was conditional, and demanded the preservation of a democratic local autonomy, the equality of all nationalities and religions.

The Resolution of the National Assembly

The Assembly also formed from 200 of its members, plus 50 co-opted members a High National Romanian Council of Transylvania, the new permanent parliament of Transylvania.

The next day, on 2 December 1918 the High National Romanian Council of Transylvania formed a government under the name of Directing Council of Transylvania, Banat and the Romanian Lands in Hungary, headed by Iuliu Maniu.

On December 11, 1918, King Ferdinand signed the Law regarding the Union of Transylvania, Banat, Crișana, the Satmar and Maramureș with the Old Kingdom of Romania,[6] decreeing that:

The lands named in the resolution of the Alba-Iulia National Assembly of the 18th of November 1918 are and remain forever united with the Kingdom of Romania.

• Great Union
• Union of Bukovina with Romania
• Union of Bessarabia with Romania
• Union of Hungary and Romania (proposal)
• Greater Romania
• Kingdom of Romania
• History of Transylvania
• Congress of Oppressed Nationalities of the Austro-Hungarian Empire

• Ion Bulei, Scurta istorie a românilor, Editura Meronia, Bucuresti, 1996, pp. 104–107.
• Dumitru Preda, Vasile Alexandrescu and Costică Prodan. În apărarea Romaniei Mari, București, 1994.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Union of Transilvania with Romania.

• Virtual Museum of the Union
• National Day of Romania site with information about the event and webcam showing 2005 celebrations (by the Alba County Prefecture)
• Map of proposed partition of Austria-Hungary (1906)
• Union of Transylvania with Romania (in Romanian)
• "Lumea magazin", no. 9, 2004
• SZARKA LÁSZLÓ Kisebbségi léthelyzetek - közösségi alternatívák (in Hungarian)
• FRÁTER OLIVÉR Erdély mint hadszíntér 1916-1922-ben (in Hungarian) Archived 2009-09-28 at the Wayback Machine
• Translated text of the 1916 secret treaty and comments (in Hungarian)