“CELESTIAL SANZIENES”
ON THE BUCOVINA WAY

-text and photos Andrei Dorian Gheorghe
design Florin Alexandru Stancu-

On the night of 2018 June 23/24
I saw, on the Bucovina Way,
the sky opening during the “Sanzienes”,
a great Romanian folkloric festival.

Bucovina is a special province in Romanian history.

Here, in the 14th century,
a Romanian “voievod” of Maramures, Dragos,
founded the march of Moldova,
and a few years later,
another Maramuresan “voievod”, Bogdan,
stopped the Magyar pressures
and founded the Romanian state of Moldova.

Thus, this zone became the nucleus of a new state
on the map of Europe,
spreading identity for Romanians from the Eastern Carpathians
to the Black Sea and the Dniester River,
who formed the majority of the inhabitants here.

Also here, the “voievod” and “domnitor” Stefan the Great (1457-1504)
chose his Capital City, Suceava
(where he resisted against the siege of the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II),
began to “cultivate” over 40 stone churches,
and became the protector of Orthodox Christianity
after the fall of Constantinople.

But in 1774-1777,
after an understanding between the Habsburg Empire and the Ottoman Empire,
the Austrians annexed Bucovina
while the Ottomans killed the “domnitor” of Moldova, Grigore Ghica III,
who had opposed to this territorial crime.

Then, in over 140 years of domination,
the Habsburgs transformed Bucovina into
the “Romanian Dukedom” of their empire,
but brought here many Ukrainians, Germans, Jews and Poles
(especially to the northern zone).

After World War I
Bucovina returned to Romanians as part of the Kingdom of Romania
(after a nationalist campaign led by Iancu Knight of Flondor,
being militarily defended against the Slavic Bolsheviks
by Ilie Lazar and his soldiers),
but after World War II its north became part of the Soviet Union,
and after 1990 part of Ukraine.

Today a spectacular road crosses “Romanian” Bucovina from west to east,
among beautiful “obcines” (something between hills and mountains),
passing through a few beautiful small towns
(Vatra Dornei, Campulung Moldovenesc, Gura Humorului)
and continuing with a separation toward Suceava
and toward Falticeni.

In 2018 June
I went on the Bucovina Way,
trying to reconstitute, on a foggy weather.
one of the roads of Dragos, Bogdan
and their “teams”…

…and I photographically caught
a small rainbow…

I also went on the Bucovina Way
on a sunny weather…

… and I photographically caught
even the Sun.

On the Bucovina Way I made a halt in Pojorata,
where I admired the fine landscapes
on a foggy weather…

… and on a sunny weather…

I also admired a Bucovinan traditional stone gate
in combination with the Sun and the Moon
at a pension named just… “Longing for Forest”.

The Sanzienes’ Holiday,
old even from the Geto-Dacian times
and following the Summer Solstice,
opens the sky in June 23/24.

Good goddesses,
the Sanzienes dance and positively influence
people, plants and animals,
transforming the entire day of June 24
into a solar-floral festival.

Lucky me,
I saw the Moon in festive state over there,
during the Night of the Sanzienes.