Sighişoara/Segesvár
Sighişoara/Segesvár
Terms in other languages and older terms
Hungarian: Segesvár, Latin: Castrum Sex. Earlier references in documents: Scheßpurch/g, Segusvar, Zegisvar.
Etymology
There is still no consensus on the origin of the German name, derived from the Hungarian ‘Segesvár’, or on some older designations, such as the Latin reference to ‘Castrum Sex’. The problem here lies with the first element of the name, ‘SE(GE)S’; the meaning of the term for ‘castle’ in the second element of the name – ‘-vár’, ‘castrum’ or ‘-burg’ – is, by contrast, evident. The omission of a syllable in the German-language – including regional dialect – first element of the compound (when derived from the Hungarian ‘seges-’) has not yet been convincingly explained; by contrast, little attention has so far been paid to the obvious connections between the monosyllabic nature of the first part of the word in both Latin and German. The existing attempts at explanation range from the Hungarian ‘seg’ (behind, beyond) via West Germanic ‘Seggh/ch’ (marsh), Latin ‘sex’ as ‘sixth castle’ to an erroneous ‘Sax’ (for ‘Saxons’). The well-known Romanian historian Nicolae Iorga interprets ‘seges-’ as ‘sebes’ (Hungarian for ‘fast’) and links it to the Schaaser stream. Whilst Iorga’s derivation, like the others, is likely to be dismissed, his reference to the connection between the name and the Schaaser stream and valley is, at least for the German and Latin designations, indicative.
Location
Sighișoara is situated at 46° 13′ north latitude and 24° 47′ east longitude, 92 km from Sibiu.
Topography
Sighișoara lies in the valley ofthe Târnava Mare, on the Târnava plateau, which consists of ridges 500–600 metres high, separated by deep valleys. The town lies in the southern tip of Mureș County, which is situated in the centre of the Transylvanian Plateau.
Political and administrative affiliation
Romania (România). A municipality in Mureș County (Județ) in Transylvania.
Common symbolism
The coat of arms of Sighișoara depicts a silver castle with three towers on a red shield. In the castle gate, a crowned golden lion can be seen holding a sword in its paw.
Middle Ages
Sighișoara is one of the seven towns founded by the Transylvanian Saxons and is closely linked to their history.
The plateau at the confluence of the Schaaser Bach (‘Burgberg’ and ‘Schulberg’) with the Große Kokel shows no evidence of continuous settlement. Pre-Roman and Roman artefacts have been unearthed during archaeological excavations. Originally, the Burgberg was the site of an earth and timber fortress built by the Székelys, with an adjoining settlement which, from its strategically prominent position at the confluence of the Schaaser Bach, dominated the valley of the Große Kokel at the narrows there; the name of the settlement – Hungarian Segesvár, from which the Romanian name Sighișoara is derived – indicates this. The Székelys, as a ‘border-guarding people’, had been resettled to outlying regions along the Eastern Carpathians following the eastward shift of the Kingdom of Hungary’s borders.
The Saxon settlement, which came to shape the town’s subsequent culture and history, was established on the site of the Székely settlement and fortress at the earliest by the end of the 12th century (according to local tradition and chronicles), but probably not until after the Mongol invasion in the mid-13th century. The phase of settlement by the Transylvanian Saxons, during which Sighisoara was founded, coincided with a period when further Saxon settlement movements were directed from the districts around Sibiu and the Altland region, heading north-west towards the Kokel area, where the Sighisoara District and the Two Districts (Mediasch/Mediaș and Schelk) emerged. The settlement of the Sighisoara District took place in three stages: in the first half of the century, the area of the Upper District around Keisd/Saschiz, which was initially also a district suburb; following the Mongol invasion of 1241, in a second stage, the Middle District around Sighișoara; in a third stage, during the second half of the century, the Lower Seat around Dunnesdorf/Daneș to the west and, beyond the Kokel, Großalisch and others. The route of the trade route from the Törzburg Carpathian Pass to Klausenburg/Cluj-Napoca was relocated in the 13th century from Keisder to the Schaaser Valley, which made Schäßburg an important junction with the east-west route along the Kokel and, consequently, a seat of the district administration, serving as the centre of administration and justice, whilst religious administration remained with the Keisder chapter.
The first documented references date from 1298 (‘Schespurch’, also in 1309, 1406, 1429, 1442 and 1451)[1], then in 1300 (‘Segusvar’, also in 1309, 1337, 1339, 1353), ‘Castrum Sex’ (1320, 1349, 1369, 1374, 1376, 1411, 1417, 1432, 1450), ‘Seghisoara’ in 1436. The settlement’s urban character is already evident from the earliest surviving document, which mentions the Dominican abbey in the town. From the very beginning, Sighișoara was a town of merchants and craftsmen. As in all Transylvanian Saxon towns, the guild system flourished rapidly; the self-government of the settlers, who were granted royal privileges (Andreanum 1224), was modelled on that of the imperial cities. Sighișoara found itself in competition with the other major Saxon towns – Sibiu, Brașov/Brassó, Mediaș and Bistrița/Bistritz/Beszterce – after it had overtaken Keisd as the seat of the bishopric.
Construction of the city walls began in the mid-14th century; it was also during this period that the town was first mentioned as a ‘civitas’ (1367). Between 1431 and 1435, Vlad II Dracul (1395–1447), the future voivode of Wallachia, lived in exile in Sighișoara. Among other things, he had coins minted here which were in circulation throughout Transylvania.
The registers of the universities of Vienna, Kraków and other educational institutions record 95 students from Sighisoara for the 15th century. A poorhouse and a hospital were established in the 15th century. The prosperous town held a market twice a year; the mountain church and the monastery church were expanded into three-nave late-Gothic hall churches. In 1488, 600 households were recorded in Sighisoara.
Early modern period
For Sighișoara, too, the long period of Ottoman rule over Hungary and Transylvania, which began with the Battle of Mohács in 1526, marked a major turning point. Unlike the southern parts of Saxony, the Kokel region suffered less from the Turkish incursions of the 15th century; however, the great campaign of 1438 in particular also affected Sighisoara to a considerable extent.
Even before the start of the ‘Turkish period’, the town’s architecture – with its churches and fortifications in the town centre – had already taken on its present-day appearance. Thanks to craft trades and commerce, the town prospered even in the Early Modern period despite frequent sieges and occupations by various warring factions; Sighisoara, like Sibiu, usually sided with the Imperial forces, which entailed not only destruction and loss of life but also considerable financial sacrifices.
The Sighisoara town charter of 1517 is the oldest surviving town charter in Transylvania. The assembly of the ‘Saxon Nations’ University’ – the confederation of the autonomous chairs and districts of the Transylvanian Saxons – met repeatedly in Sighisoara. At the provincial assembly held in Sighisoara in 1506 – the gathering of the Transylvanian estates – the Unio trium Nationum, the alliance of the three estates (nobility, Székelys and Saxons), was reaffirmed. At the provincial assembly of 1538 in Sighisoara, the religious disputation between Bishops Martinuzzi (Oradea) and Szantay (Košice/Kassa) took place, an event of great significance for the future religious destiny of the Transylvanian Saxons. Provincial assemblies continued to be held regularly in Sighisoara thereafter. In 1526, the first mention was made of a ‘neighbourhood’ – a form of organisation typical of the Transylvanian Saxons, providing local social security and communal organisation. After 1550, the Dominicans left the town and the monastery church became the town’s parish church.
Sighisoara was repeatedly drawn into the centre of the numerous conflicts between the Habsburg Monarchy and the Ottoman Empire on the one hand, and the Transylvanian nobility and the Saxon towns on the other. In 1551, troops under the command of the imperial general Castaldo (1493–1563) were stationed in the town to secure the Habsburgs’ (short-lived) occupation of Transylvania. Half a century later, in 1601, the town was sacked by Walloon mercenaries under the Habsburg general Basta (1550–1607) and occupied shortly afterwards by the Székelys; a plague epidemic in 1603 was followed by a further occupation of the town by Basta’s troops. Between 1658 and 1663, Sighișoara once again suffered greatly from the fighting between the Transylvanian nobility, the Habsburgs and the Ottomans. This was followed, until the end of Ottoman suzerainty under the Treaty of Karlowitz (1699) and the establishment of Habsburg rule in Transylvania following the suppression of the subsequent Hungarian Kuruc uprising under Prince Franz II Rákóczi (1676–1735) by the Emperor in 1711, a series of military campaigns and sieges ensued. Added to this were plague epidemics in 1603 (claiming 2,000 lives in the town), 1647 and 1709 (claiming 4,000 lives, equivalent to approximately four-fifths of the population), fires in 1676, 1736 and 1788, and a severe flood in 1771.
The chronicle of the town notary Georg Kraus is an important source for the history of Sighișoara, but also for the whole of Transylvania in the 17th century.[2]
Modern History and Contemporary History
Following the incorporation of Transylvania as a crown land into the Habsburg Empire, Sighișoara lost its military and strategic importance as a fortress. The reign of Maria Theresa and Joseph II initially brought the town the oppressive burden of having regiments from the Military Frontier quartered there, as well as Counter-Reformation efforts.
In 1849, the troops of Kossuth’s Hungarian revolutionary government, under General Józef Bem (1794–1850) were defeated near Sighișoara by Russian forces under General Alexander von Lüders (1790–1874), who had been called in to support the Habsburgs; during this ‘Battle of Segesvár’, the Hungarian national poet Sándor Petőfi (1823–1849), who was serving as an adjutant under Bem, also fell.
Towards the end of the 18th century, the purely Saxon character of Sighișoara gradually began to change: a Romanian primary school was first mentioned in 1784, and in 1797 an Orthodox church was built for the Romanian population.
Alongside the changes in the ethnic composition of the population, the town strove to keep pace with modernity, particularly in the second half of the 19th century: trade associations, technical colleges, trading houses, cultural societies and sports facilities were established. In 1872, Sighișoara was connected to the international railway network. The 19th century also saw the beginning of a fruitful period for German-language journalism and the press. The first newspaper, the *Schässburger Anzeiger*( ), was published from 1872; from 1879, the *Großkokler Bote* appeared from the printing works and publishing house founded by F. Horeth, and from 1900 the *Schäßburger Zeitung*.
In 1876, the Hungarian government dissolved the ‘National University’, marking the definitive end of Saxon self-government. Sighișoara became the seat of the county of Groß-Kokelburg (Hungarian: Nagy-Küküllő). Large sections of the Dominican monastery were demolished to make way for the county palace (now the town hall). The visit of Buffalo Bill’s circus to Sighișoara on 16 July 1906 symbolised the town’s engagement with international developments.
Following the First World War, Transylvania was ceded to the Kingdom of Romania under the Treaty of Trianon. Sighisoara remained, in continuity with the old administrative structures, the administrative centre of the Groß-Kokelburg district (Romanian: Județul Târnava-Mare) until 1950.
The interwar period and the war years unfolded for Sighișoara against the backdrop of events that shaped the Transylvanian Saxon community: an economic boom in the 1920s due to its new central location within Greater Romania, the gradual rise to power of the National Socialists from 1933 onwards and the town’s subsumption into the ‘Third Reich’s’ great power politics, and the participation of the town’s sons, as members of the Waffen-SS, in the war of annihilation against the Soviet Union and in operations against partisans in the Balkans. On 9–10 September 1944, the town was captured by the Red Army. On 14 January 1945, 464 Saxons from Sighișoara were deported to the Soviet Union for forced labour.
In 1948, the Communists expropriated all businesses without compensation and nationalised the schools, which hit the German inhabitants particularly hard, as most of the town’s business owners came from their ranks and the German-language education system had, until then, been run exclusively by the Evangelical Church A. B. in Romania. In the 1960s, the exodus of the Transylvanian Saxons began in Sighișoara too. During the communist era, and particularly from the late 1970s onwards, the town’s fundamental Transylvanian-Saxon character steadily eroded; it is now predominantly inhabited by Romanians. The few remaining Germans are currently organised politically and culturally within the Sighișoara Centre Forum, part of the Transylvanian Regional Forum of the DFDR (Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania).
Săcșar’s twin towns include Dinkelsbühl in Germany, where the annual ‘Heimattag’ (Homeland Day) for the Transylvanian Saxons takes place, and Baden in Switzerland.
Population and Religion
The figures from the censuses provide an insight into the city’s ethnic and demographic development:[3] The census data clearly show the rise in the proportion of Hungarian and Romanian residents and, ultimately, the end of the Saxon majority at the beginning of the 20th century. Particularly in the 16th and 17th centuries, the town’s population was subject to significant demographic fluctuations, as suggested by the figures for innkeepers recorded in the tax rolls: 1488 – 600 households (innkeepers), 1522 – 438, 1589 – 848, 1602 – 811, 1609 – 413, 1660 – 828, 1663 – 683. The figures clearly show how dramatically military events, natural disasters, fires and epidemics affected the town’s population; but they also show how the gaps were filled each time and how the town quickly recovered as a magnet for the region’s population. The lack of demographic dynamism within the German population group is also evident.
| 2011 | 1992 | 1977 | 1948 | 1930 | 1910 | 1880 | 1850 | 1700 | |
| Total | 28,102 | 34,537 | 30,904 | 15,992 | 13,033 | 11,587 | 8,417 | 8,417 | 5,579 |
| Romanians | 19,632 | 25,387 | 19,167 | 9,363 | 4,366 | 3,031 | 2,029 | 1,742 | 396 |
| Hungary | 4,643 | 6,948 | 5,726 | 2,136 | 2,896 | 2,687 | 1,140 | 382 | 114 |
| Roma | 1,471 | 853 | 509 | N/A | 356 | n/a | 285 | 273 | ? |
| German | 403 | 1,327 | 5,492 | 6,320 | 5,236 | 5,486 | 4,963 | 4,777 | 5,052 |
| Jews | -- | 2 | 10 | 217 | 146 | N/A | N/A | 6 | ? |
| Other | 22 | N/A | N/A | 560 | N/A | 383 | N/A | N/A | ? |
| Not determined | 1,908 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
In the 2011 census, the urban population declared the following religious affiliations: 19,901 Orthodox, 2,217 Reformed, 1,494 Roman Catholic, 911 Unitarian, 397 Evangelical A. B., 314 Pentecostals, 180 Greek Catholics, 170 Baptists, 163 Jehovah’s Witnesses, 94 Seventh-day Adventists, 124 of other religious affiliations, 34 with no religious affiliation, 20 atheists, 1,937 who did not specify.[4]
Economy
Since the industrialisation that swept through Sighișoara from the end of the 19th century, the textile industry in particular has shaped the local economy; in addition, important glass and earthenware factories were established in the 1950s and 1960s, alongside the engineering and iron industries that had already been in existence since the beginning of the century. Heavy industry was largely absent, which facilitated the restructuring processes following reunification.
At present, the largest employers in Sighișoara are based in the sectors of ceramics (Cesiro, Siceram, VES), dairy products/foodstuffs (Hochland), technical textiles (GST) and clothing (Târnava, Transtex). In addition, tourism plays a significant role for Sighișoara, as it is one of Romania’s most popular destinations.
Architecture, Art History
Sighișoara’s significance as a tourist centre is linked to the historic architecture of the Lower and Upper Towns. As one of the last inhabited castle complexes in Europe to have been preserved almost in its entirety, the site was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1999.
Several buildings are particularly noteworthy: the preserved castle fortifications, an almost complete curtain wall originally featuring 14 defensive towers (nine of which remain), which were built and maintained by the guilds, and the Clock Tower, the town’s landmark which was renovated in 1677, give the town its ‘medieval’ character. The complex on the upper plateau of the Upper Town, comprising the Bergkirche, the cemetery and the Bergschule, is connected to the Upper Town proper on the lower plateau by the covered ‘Schülertreppe’ (Pupils’ Staircase). Here there are numerous preserved secular buildings from the 16th and 17th centuries. The monastery church, built between 1492 and 1515, which has undergone numerous alterations and been repaired following damage, features a preserved late-Gothic apse and houses, alongside a collection of Oriental carpets, a baptismal font by the Săcșar bell-founder Jakob, dating from 1440; the altar and organ are Baroque works, also by Saxon masters.
The town is home to numerous churches, including an Orthodox cathedral. On the site of the demolished Franciscan church stands the Roman Catholic church, built between 1894 and 1896; the Reformed church was completed in 1889. The surviving synagogue (13 Tache Ionescu Street) of the small, now defunct Jewish community was built in 1903.
A special historical and cultural event is the ‘Skopationsfest’ organised by the secondary school pupils of Sighișoara. Today, Sighișoara hosts several annual festivals, the best known of which is the ‘Medieval Festival’.
4. Controversies, Discourses
Vlad Țepeș (Vlad Drăculea III, 1431–1476) is consistently referred to as such, although only his (probable) year of birth, 1431, coincides with a possible period of exile spent by his father, Vlad Dracul, in Sighișoara, and there is no other evidence whatsoever to suggest he was born in the town. Sighisoara is thus, alongside Bran Castle near Brașov (Castelul Bran), the second place where the Dracula myth is exploited for tourism. However, the construction of a Dracula theme park on the Breite, a plateau near the town that is a protected landscape area, was prevented by civil society and political interventions and protests. The commercialisation of the medieval Dracula image for tourism continues to attract criticism.[5] The ‘medieval character’ of Sighișoara’s Upper and Lower Towns, however, is a misrepresentation serving tourist purposes that does not correspond to the architectural facts: Only in the architectural structure of the two late-Gothic churches and the overall layout of the fortress can genuinely original medieval features be discerned. The fortifications and inner buildings, as well as the historic fabric of the Lower Town situated in front of them, date for the most part from the 16th and 17th centuries; the town’s landmark, the Clock Tower, did not acquire its present appearance until 1677, after it had been severely damaged in the great town fire of 1676. The supposed birthplace of Vlad III Țepeș was not built until two centuries after his birth.
Bibliography
- Gheorghe Baltag: Sighișoara. Sibiu 2011 (translated from Romanian by Dieter Nowak).
- Hans-Heinz Brandsch; Heinz Heitmann; Walter Lingner (eds.): Sighișoara. A portrait of a Transylvanian town. Leer² 1998 (Publications of the Transylvanian Saxon Foundation; 34) [1st ed.: Thaur near Innsbruck 1994].
- Emil Giurgiu: Sighișoara [Schässburg]. Bucharest 1985.
- Gernot Nussbächer: From Documents and Chronicles. Vol. 9: Schäßburg. Kronstadt 2010.
- Christoph Machat: The Mountain Church at Schäßburg and Medieval Architecture in Transylvania. Munich 1977.
- Richard Schuller: Old Schäßburg. Schäßburg 1934.
- Renate Schuster: Sighisoara, a UNESCO World Heritage Site: Buildings and Architectural Style of a Formerly German-Settled Town in Romania. Saarbrücken 2014.
Web links
- www.sighisoara.org.ro (City Council website)
- www.forumschaessburg.eu (Website of the DFDR [Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania], Sighișoara branch)
- www.ev-kirche-schaessburg.ro (Website of the A. B. Sighișoara Protestant Parish)
- www.hog-schaessburg.de (Website of the Sighișoara Hometown Association; this association publishes the newsletter *Schäßburger Nachrichten*, which appears several times a year)
Notes
[1] A document dated 1280, on the basis of which the town’s 700th-anniversary celebrations were held in 1980, is in all likelihood misdated due to a scribal error and actually dates from the 1320s, see Nussbächer 2010, pp. 37–39.
[2] Published as the Transylvanian Chronicle of Georg Kraus, town clerk of Sighișoara, 1608–65, by the committee of the Society for Transylvanian Regional Studies (eds.), by the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Vienna in two parts in the *Oesterreichische Geschichtsquellen* (first section: *Scriptores*. Vol. III, 1862; Vol. IV, 1864); cf. Georg Daniel Teutsch: *Georg Kraus*. In: ADB, Vol. 17 (1887), pp. 70–72.
[3] The figures are based on various official sources and overviews from the Hungarian and Romanian statistical authorities, compiled by E. Árpád Varga: Maros megye településeinek etnikai (anyanyelvi/nemzetiségi) adatai 1850–1992 (Ethnic data [mother tongue/nationality] of the settlements in Mureș County 1850–1992), available online at: www.kia.hu/konyvtar/erdely/erd2002/msetn02.pdf (accessed on 24 January 2016), as well as census data from the Romanian Institute of Statistics: www.insse.ro; the figures are not always consistent, and there are discrepancies between different years. For example, according to other sources, the total population in 1977 was 33,208; in my view, the figures are not exact, but they accurately reflect the development of Sighișoara’s demographic structures; the figures for 1700 and the data on households in previous centuries are taken from E. J. Graef: *The Population of Sighișoara*. In: Brandsch/Heitmann/Lingner 1998, pp. 61–64.
[4]www.recensamantromania.ro/rezultate-2/ (Table 13).
[5] See ‘Disneyland for vampire fans’ in: FAZ, 20 March 2002, online: www.faz.net/aktuell/gesellschaft/themenpark-dracula-disneyland-fuer-vampirfreunde-150869.html; see also: Keno Verseck: ‘Dracula from the care home’. 14 August 2012; online: www.keno-verseck.de/dracula-aus-dem-altersheim/.
Citation
Thomas Schares: Schäßburg/Sighișoara/Segesvár. In: Online Encyclopaedia on the Culture and History of Germans in Eastern Europe, 2020. URL: ome-lexikon.uni-oldenburg.de/p32534 (as at 31 August 2020).
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