Tsarist autocracy
The future journalist, born in Russian-held Bessarabia (the Bessarabia Governorate), was a member of the ethnic Romanian cultural elite, and, reportedly, a graduate of the Bessarabian Orthodox Church Chișinău Theological Seminary. According to other sources, he spent his early years in Kiev and graduated from the Pavlo Galagan College. Nour furthered his studies in other regions of the Russian Empire, where he became a familiar figure to those who opposed Tsarist autocracy, and exchanged ideas with radical young men of various ethnic backgrounds. He is known to have studied Philology at Kiev University, where he affiliated with the underground Socialist-Revolutionary (Eser) Party, probably infiltrated in its ranks by the "Okhrana".