Journal Analele Banatului N.S. Archaeology-History

Teodora Ligia Drăghici

Confirmări ale nobilităţii solicitate autorităţilor comitatense în cursul secolului al XIX-lea de către reprezentanţi ai familiilor de origine română înnobilate în secolele XVI – XVIII / Nobility Confirmation Asked From The County Authorities In The 19th Century By The Representatives Of The Romanian Origin Noble Families Ennobled During 16th – 18th Centuries

Jan. 1, 2012

Abstract

! e present article reff ers to the phenomenon of 19th century nobility confi rmations asked by members of the noble families that gained their nobility during the 16th – 18th centuries for devoted military or executory services. ! e Romanian origin of the protagonists of the 19th century documents kept in the local administration archives is not explicitly revealed but more or less presumed based on their christian names and sometimes on their religion. Starting with the second half of the 16th century there can be detected a radical change in the way the nobility parchments were conferred being of common knowledge the proliferation of the armorial nobility in Transylvania, Banat and Partium. ! e exempt from obligations, usually of fi scal origin and the conferring of certain privileges to the ennobled person, which sometimes extended also upon his descendants, accompanied by a coat of arms, represented a characteristic of the phenomenon of ennoblement. ! e information kept about certain families of Romanian origin who’s descendents asked the confi rmation of their nobility based on nobility parchments received by their forefathers from the Hungarian kings, rulers of Transylvanian Principality and later on by the Habsburg emperors, help the historians to complete a global image of the phenomenon of ennoblement during the centuries. ! ere are plenty of documents kept at the level of local administration during the 19th century in which one witnesses the practice of requiring and getting the confi rmation of the nobility. One of the families that frequently appears in documents and sometimes the information is backed up also by the Romanian and Hungarian bibliography of the late 19th and early 20th centuries is Faur family originally from Teiuș who’s members lived also in Arad, Timiș, Caraș, Cenad, Zărand Counties. Testimony was also kept about a member of the well known Matskási of Tinkova family, namely Matskásy Lajos junior who asked the representatives of Caraș county to confirm his nobility based on the fact that his father Matskásy Lajos senior enjoyed certain privileges as a noble and civil servant of the Szeckler Chairs of Odorhei, Cristur and Brăduţ. Not only well known families of Romanian origin as Matskásy (Măcicaș) family can be traced out but also other names as Cornia alias Barb, Pap alias Popvici, Fogarasy, Șubony, Jumanca and Racz. Certain descendents with the name of Racz appear during the 19th century process of nobility confirmation but one cannot tell if the family was of Serbian or Romanian origin, on the one hand because of the fact that both Romanians and Serbians had the same orthodox religion and on the other hand because the translation from Hungarian language of the word „racz” is Serbian. There are also some Romanian names recorded in the lists of noble man from Caraș county such as Nicolae Krecsun, Koszta Greku, Mihaly Krecsun, Iuon Blusovan, Athanasie Doma, Dioniszie Popeszko, Paszku Miksa and so on but they might gain their nobility during the second half of the 18th century or even during the 19th century as the documents do not give information concerning this aspect.