Phanariote to the throne of
the principality of Moldavia'[1] (1711).

[Footnote 1: Xenopol, op. cit., ii. 138]

Knowledge of foreign languages had enabled the Phanariotes to obtain
important diplomatic positions at Constantinople, and they ended by
acquiring the thrones of the Rumanian principalities as a recompense for
their services. But they had to pay for it, and to make matters more
profitable the Turks devised the ingenious method of transferring the
princes from one province to another, each transference being considered
as a new nomination. From 1730 to 1741 the two reigning princes
interchanged thrones in this way three times. They acquired the throne by
gold, and they could only keep it by gold. All depended upon how much they
wore able to squeeze out of the country. The princes soon became past
masters in the art of spoliation. They put taxes upon chimneys, and the
starving peasants pulled their cottages down and went to live in mountain
caves; they taxed the animals, and the peasants preferred to kill the few
beasts they possessed. But this often proved no remedy, for we are told
that the Prince Constantin Mavrocordato, having prescribed a tax on
domestic animals at a time when an epidemic had broken out amongst them,
ordered the tax to be levied on the carcasses. 'The Administrative regime
during the Phanariote period was, in general, little else than organized
brigandage,' says Xenopol[1]. In fact the Phanariote rule was instinct
with corruption, luxury, and intrigue. Though individually some of them
may not deserve blame, yet considering what the Phanariotes took out of
the country, what they introduced into it, and to what extent they
prevented its development, their era was the most calamitous in Rumanian
history.

[Footnote 1: Ibid, op. cit., ii. 308]

The war of 1768 between Russia and Turkey gave the former power a vague
protectorate over the Rumanian provinces (Treaty of Kutchuk Kainardji). In
1774 Austria acquired from the Turks, by false promises, the northern part
of Moldavia, the pleasant land of Bucovina. During the new conflict
between Turkey and Russia, the Russian armies occupied and battened upon
the Rumanian provinces for six years. Though they had again to abandon
their intention of making the Danube the southern boundary of their
empire--to which Napoleon had agreed by the secret treaty with Tsar
Alexander (Erfurt, September 27, 1808)--they obtained from Turkey the
cession of Bessar