Cultural Heritage

Present-day Transylvania has been shaped by the ebb and flow of conquerors over many centuries. Through history, the region has the easternmost point of many great European empires.

The Roman Empire, the Holy Roman Empire and the Hapsburg Empire have all occupied the area and instilled a bit of their own culture into that of the native Dacian people. From afar, Transylvania participated in the high Middle Ages, Renaissance, Enlightenment, Reformation and other Western European cultural movements.

Meanwhile, the Carpathian Alps to the East and South prevented conquest by eastern armies like the Ottoman Empire.

The result is a captivating Latin culture filled with warm, passionate and hardworking people. Today, when one travels across the Carpathians into Transylvania, they’re crossing not only a geographical border, but a historically cultural one too. Author Robert D. Kaplan describes it as “entering Europe through the back door.”