Moldova

The principality of Moldavia emerged in the 14th century between the Carpathians and the Dniester. Its greatest ruler, Stephen the Great (1457–1504), fought off Ottomans, Hungarians and Poles and built dozens of monasteries; his statue stands at the entrance to Chișinău's central park. From the 16th century Moldavia became an Ottoman tributary, governed for a time by Greek Phanariot princes.

In 1812 Russia annexed the eastern half, between the Prut and Dniester, and called it Bessarabia. Chișinău, a small market town, was laid out as a provincial capital on a grid. The western half joined Wallachia to form Romania in 1859. In 1918 Bessarabia voted to unite with Romania, where it stayed until 1940.

The Soviet Union took Bessarabia in 1940 under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and created the Moldavian SSR, adding a strip east of the Dniester that had been an autonomous republic inside Soviet Ukraine. Romania, allied with Germany, retook it in 1941–44, and its Jewish population was deported and murdered in large numbers. The Soviets returned in 1944, followed by famine in 1946–47 and deportations in 1949.

Independence came on 27 August 1991. A brief war in 1992 with Russian-backed separatists left Transnistria outside government control. The 1990s and 2000s were marked by poverty, emigration and swings between pro-Russian and pro-European governments.

The language spoken by most Moldovans is Romanian. Soviet policy called it 'Moldovan', wrote it in Cyrillic and promoted the idea of a separate nation. In 1989 the Latin alphabet was restored and Romanian (under the name Moldovan) became the state language — the change that fuelled the Transnistrian and Gagauz breakaway movements.

For three decades the constitution kept the term 'Moldovan', while the 1991 declaration of independence and the Constitutional Court said Romanian. In 2023 parliament replaced 'Moldovan' with 'Romanian' in all laws. Around a million Moldovans also hold Romanian citizenship, which gives them EU passports.

Russian remains widely spoken, especially in Chișinău, the north, Gagauzia and Transnistria. Gagauzia, a Turkic-speaking Orthodox Christian autonomy in the south, and Bulgarian-speaking Taraclia add to the mix. Language choice signals politics, so many people switch easily and visitors are best starting in English or Romanian.

Wine has been made here since antiquity, and Moldova has one of the highest shares of land under vines in the world. In Soviet times it was a main supplier of wine and brandy to the USSR, favouring volume. Russian embargoes in 2006 and 2013 forced producers to turn to quality and to Western markets.

The limestone quarried to build Chișinău left huge tunnels, turned into cellars. Cricova's streets run for about 120 km and are driven by car; Mileștii Mici holds a Guinness record for the largest wine collection, with around two million bottles. Estates such as Purcari, Castel Mimi, Et Cetera and Château Vartely now offer tastings, restaurants and rooms.

Native grapes include Fetească Neagră, Rară Neagră and Fetească Albă alongside international varieties. National Wine Day, on the first weekend of October, fills central Chișinău with producers' stalls. Divin, aged grape brandy, is the spirit; Kvint in Tiraspol is its best-known brand.

About nine in ten Moldovans are Orthodox. Most parishes belong to the Metropolis of Chișinău under the Moscow Patriarchate, while a smaller Metropolis of Bessarabia answers to the Romanian Patriarchate; since 2022 many priests and parishes have switched to the Romanian church, a sign of the country's reorientation.

The most striking sites are the cave monasteries cut into limestone cliffs above rivers. Orheiul Vechi, above a loop of the Răut, has cells dug by monks in the 13th–15th centuries and a working chapel. Țipova and Saharna on the Dniester combine rock chapels with waterfalls and walking paths.

Forest monasteries in the Codrii hills, such as Căpriana (one of the oldest) and Hâncu, survived Soviet closures and were restored after 1990. Easter, with blessings of baskets of eggs and cakes, and Memorial Easter (Paștele Blajinilor), when families picnic at graves, are the big religious days.

Moldovan food is Romanian at its core with Ukrainian, Russian, Turkish and Balkan influences: mămăligă with sheep's cheese and sour cream, sour soups (zeamă, ciorbă), stuffed cabbage (sarmale), plăcinte pastries and grilled mititei. Orthodox fasting periods make many dishes meatless for weeks at a time.

Most families still grow vegetables, keep hens and make wine at home; village houses have painted gates and wells with carved covers. Hospitality is intense: guests are fed until they refuse firmly. The Central Market in Chișinău is the place to see produce from across the country.

Around a quarter of working-age Moldovans live abroad, in Italy, Romania, Russia, the UK and elsewhere; remittances pay for new houses in villages where the grandparents stay with the children.

Moldova applied to join the EU days after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine and became a candidate in June 2022; accession talks opened in June 2024. President Maia Sandu was re-elected in 2024, a referendum narrowly added the EU goal to the constitution, and her party kept its majority in the September 2025 election despite large vote-buying schemes linked to Russia.

The war next door brought hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees through the country, drones and missile debris in its airspace, and an energy shock: Russian gas transit through Ukraine ended in January 2025, cutting supplies to Transnistria, whose power plant had supplied much of Moldova's electricity. Moldova now buys energy through Romania.

Moldova remains one of Europe's poorest countries by income, but Chișinău has a growing IT sector, new cafés and wine bars, and tourism is rising from a low base.