Bistrita

Bistrita

Location

The town was named after the Bistriţa River, whose name comes from the Slavic word bystrica meaning "fast-moving water".

Etymology

The earliest sign of settlement in the area of Bistriţa is in Neolithic remains. The Turkic Pechenegs settled the area in 12th century following attack from Cumans.Transylvanian Saxons settled the area in 1206 and called the region "Nösnerland". A large part of settlers were fugitives, convicts and poor people looking for lands and opportunities.The destruction of Markt Nosa ("Market Nösen") under the Mongols of central Europe is described in a document from 1241. Situated on several trade routes, Bistriţa became a flourishing medieval trading post.

Bistriţa became a free royal town in 1330. In 1353 it gained the right to organize an annual 15-day fair, as well as a seal containing the coat of arms of an ostrich with a horseshoe in its beak. In 1465, the city's fortifications had 18 defensive towers and bastions defended by the local guilds. It was also defended by a Kirchenburg, or fortified church. The town was badly damaged by fire five times between 1836 and 1850. The church suffered from fire in 1857, when the tower's roof and the bells were destroyed. The roof was rebuilt after several years. Fires in the nineteenth century also destroyed much of the city's medieval citadel.

History

A Jewish community developed in Bistriţa after the prohibition on Jewish settlement there was lifted in 1848. The community was Orthodox with a strong Hasidic section, but there were also Jews who adopted German and Hungarian culture. A Zionist youth organization, Ivriyah, was founded in Bistriţa in 1901 by Nissan Kahan, who corresponded with Theodor Herzl and there was significant support for the Zionist movement in the town between the two world wars. A large yeshivah flourished under the direction of the rabbi of Bistriţa, Solomon Zalman Ullmann, in the first part of the twentieth century.

The city was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until 1918. On December 1 that year, Transylvania united with Romania, and Romanian Army troops entered Bistrița on December 5. the reverted briefly to Hungarian control between 1940 and 1944 and was reintegrated into Romania after World War II

History

The population of the city numbered 9,100 in 1891, of whom 718 (8%) were Jews; 12,155 in 1900 of whom 1,316 (11%) were Jews; 14,128 in 1930 of whom 2,198 (16%) were Jews; and 16,282 in 1941 of whom 2,358 (14%) were Jews. 1,300 Jews resettled in Bistriţa in 1947 and included survivors from the camps, former residents of neighboring villages, and others liberated from the Nazi concentration camps. The Jewish population declined steadily as a result of emigration to Israel, the United States, and Canada. By 2002, only about 15 lived in the city.

According to the last census, from 2011, there were 70,493 people living within the city of Bistriţa, making it the 30th largest city in Romania.

Demographics

The ethnic makeup was as follows: Romanians: 64,214 (91.09%) Hungarians: 4,109 (5.82%) Roma: 1,644 (2.33%) Germans (Transylvanian Saxons): 304

(0.43%) Other: 0.16%

Demographics

The City Hall

The “Andrei Mursanu” College

The Synagogue

The Evanghelical Church

The Museum of Saxon ingenuity

Andrei Muresanu Memorial House

Silversmith’s House

Ioan Zidaru House

The Cooper’s Tower

The Orthodox Cathedral

The Roman-Catholic Church