page_title: Românul
section_title: Journalistic trendsetter vs. "macaronic" experiment
hierarchical_section_title: Românul / In culture / Journalistic trendsetter vs. "macaronic" experiment
caption_attribution_description: Română: C.A.ROSETTI
context_page_description: Românul, was a political and literary newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania, from 1857 to 1905. Established as the leading voice of Romanian liberalism in the state of Wallachia, it had direct connections to the radical ideology of Western Europe. Its founder and director was the aristocrat C. A. Rosetti, known as Romantic poet, Masonic promoter and left-wing activist, seconded by the brothers Ion C. Brătianu and Dimitrie Brătianu. Românul's roots were planted in the 1848 revolutionary movement, whose press organ, Pruncul Român, was a direct predecessor.
  In its first editions, Românul helped circulate the slogans of the national emancipation ideal, and campaigned for Moldavia to join Wallachia in a union of the principalities, the basis of modern Romania. Although that union was achieved in 1859, Rosetti fell out with the elected Domnitor Alexander John Cuza, censuring his dictatorial inclinations and being in turn censored. Românul men helped topple Cuza in February 1866, after which Românul became the expression of radicalism in government.
context_section_description: During its 1881 anniversary banquet, Românul could claim to have been the longest-standing Romanian periodical to date; it was, overall, one of the most long-lived newspapers in Romania's history. In various ways, it was already a landmark of Romanian journalism: writing in 1972, historian Vasile Netea called Românul "the Romanians' first modern newspaper, a real school of journalism for the new generations of writers and publicists." Already under C. A. Rosetti, the gazette claimed various firsts in Romanian press history, most notably the introduction of a black border around the more important obituary pieces.
  Before the liberal establishment was divided into competing factions, Ghimpele cartoonists celebrated Rosetti and I. Brătianu as the champions of universal suffrage, progress and liberty. Rosetti invented his playful and pathetic alter ego, Berlicoco ("Pinecone"), referencing his novel hairdo and later used as his regular nickname.
  A picturesque aspect of the newspaper was its recourse to antiquated spellings, overly reliant on deep orthography: Romanian words spelled in accordance with Latin, Italian or French rules. In combination with grandiloquent speech, a Rosettist giveaway, these produced a language that was significantly different from the generalized phonemic orthography endorsed by Junimea. The early standard at Românul was to render the /ɨ/ sound in its own name, and in all references to the "Romanian" endonym, as a plain a, highlighting the Roman origins of the Romanians. For unknown reasons, it often replaced the letter o with the digraph uă. Românul also used an extraneous -e suffix in various common nouns, and modified the grammatical article accordingly—for instance, C. A. Rosetti was fondatorele, editorele și redactorele acestui ziare liberale (for fondatorul, editorul și redactorul acestui ziar liberal, "the founder, editor and director of this here liberal newspaper").
  Modern philologists have therefore described the standard Rosettist discourse as a "macaronic" dialect, or a constant stream of "declamatory verbiage". As early as the 1860s, Eugeniu Carada amused himself imitating his patron's verbose rhetoric, which he already found counterproductive. In a 1902 retrospective, Titu Maiorescu feigned bewilderment that, given their arguments, the Românul "rhetors" had not been committed to psychiatric wards by their own families. According to literary critic Ioana Pârvulescu, Românul was "written in a cumbersome Latinized orthography and [was] outstandingly pathetic". She also includes Românul among the period newspapers guilty of "horrific [grammatical] errors", with such "bizarre" spelling choices as to "make all assertions look ridiculous." Conversely, in his biographical profile of Rosetti, George Călinescu reads an "inflated" but coherent layer under the unusual orthographic choices. Once Vintilă Rosetti took over as manager, Românul took steps to rationalize its orthography and comb through the ungrammatical excesses.
  Sculpted by Wladimir Hegel and inaugurated in 1903, the C. A. Rosetti Monument, Bucharest, shows its subject holding a copy of Românul. A National Library of Romania fund, mysteriously kept under C. A. Rosetti's alias Dinu Rosetti, comprises most of the letters addressed to Românul. Even after its founder's death, the newspaper was known outside Romania: "Romanul of Bucharest" is mentioned by Jules Verne in his speculative novel of 1889, The Purchase of the North Pole. It is the only Romanian title cited among the press reports on the central event: the planned modification of the axial tilt.
caption: Rosetti Monument: the seated Rosetti holds a Românul copy in his left hand
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