N. I. Kharitonova Bessarabia and Pridnestrovie after  the events of the Russo-Turkish war  of 1806–1812

Abstract: The article analyzes the particularities of the period in the history of Bessarabia and Prednistrovie after the events of the Russo-Turkish war of 1806–1812 and until the beginning of the XXth century, and assesses the importance of the Treaty of Bucharest, in accordance with which Bessarabia was joined to the Russian empire based on the outcome of the military confrontations. The terms of the Treaty of Bucharest were important for the population of the region, because had Bessarabia in 1812 remained under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, then at the end of the XIXth century it would have become, along with the rest of historic Moldavia, part of the Romanian state. The modest autonomous beginnings and especially the privileges, which were accorded to Bessarabia by Russia in 1812––1818 and prescribed in the Statute of 1813 and in the Articles of 1818, had a positive effect on the economic development of the region, on its population settlement. The analysis of the socio-economic and ethnic processes in the Dniestr basin, on the basis of published sources and periodicals, clearly indicates a positive influence from the unification of Bessarabia to Russia, to the formation of a historic region with its own patterns of political, social and economic development, and to a dialogue of traditions and cultures between different ethnic groups. The joining of Bessarabia to Russia had an extremely important meaning for the region, which in this period had experienced political, socio-economic, demographic and cultural transformations, differently interpreted by historians. The author comes to the conclusion that the development of the region did not cause contestation, including on the ethnic ground.

Keywords: