In her 1901 obituary for the "Société astronomique de France", Dorothea Klumpke noted that the "Beizadea" was a native of "Scutarie" village in Russia's Bessarabia Governorate (formerly a part of Moldavia), and gives his birth date as May 11, 1821. An 1849 letter sent by Sturdza clarifies the date as Julian, which remained in use in Moldavia and Romania throughout his life, and which corresponds to May 23. It also explains that the Bessarabian locality was in fact Sculeni, his family having fled there from the ravages of the Greek Revolution in Moldavia; as a baby, he lived in Bessarabia, then in Bukovina, Austrian Empire. Other obituaries and biographies suggest that Sturdza was born at Iași, the Moldavian capital city. Grigore's parents were Mihail and his first wife, Elisabeta "Săftica" Paladi, who descended from the Rosetti family. Her relative, the politician-historian Radu Rosetti, claims that the marriage was forced, noting that Mihail was "ugly-faced, ruddy-haired, short in stature, bowlegged [and] surly". Through Săftica and through his paternal grandmother Maria (a Callimachi), Grigore was partly Greek; his great-grandfather was a Phanariote, Gregory Callimachi, who served as Moldavian Prince in the 1760s.