2796124064

•9 TJN DEBAT": LES MENTAUTE3 COLLECTIVES 639

The contribution of rural elements to the formation of Eomanian intellectuals is directly discernable : many were even Corning from yillages, sueh as Stephen the metropolitan of TJngro-Ylahia — whose stubborness and resistance to external pressure won him Daniel Panonnian’s praise and Matei Basarab’s anger — or such as Mitrofan, the bishop of Buz&u, an initiator of Modern-Greek printing in this country, but also a constant supporter of the Eomanian language in every field of actiyity.

The rural mentality influences the “urban” enyironment as well as the formation of great boyar scholars.

The rural culture was not at yariance with either the clerical or the nobiliary culture.¹⁷ Miron Costin, Dimitrie Cantemir or Constantin Can-tacuzino, writing at the time when they had reached the highest positions in society, ren der homage to it including it among the main testimonies ■of our continuity and Latinity.¹⁸

To the ordinary copyists and intellectuals,¹⁶, eyen the modality of drawing up the miscellanea reyeals the pressure of an orał mentality. They mostly kept the fragments that interested them morę rather than ąuestioning who the author was or what the basie text was.²⁰ The very act of drawing up a manuscript had to meet the reąuirements for an intensive (“and not only to read, but also to understand and follow the fact” — Bibl. c.p., p. 139) and — eventualy — also collective reading (“intr-a cui minii ya intra aceasta carte sa o iubia(B)c& pi sa o ceteasca intre oameni $i cine te va pohti ca s& i’o dai sił izvodeasca, cu toatU inima, frate sa i’o dai ... ” Bibl. c.p., p. 243-244).

From among the well-known written works, the readers selected mostly those which corresponded to the themes and subjects of orał circulation.²¹ Let us examine an example among many others. Through the collection of Ioanikie Galeatovski, Njebo novoje, translated at the end of the 17th century (and translated again a century later), the Eomanians

^lł Virgil Cflndea, Rallunea dominanto, Cluj-Napoca, 1972, p. 62 H (see also RESEE, 1968 No. 2); Gabriel Cocora, Ttpar fi cArturari, Bucure$ti, 1977, p. 143—179.

¹¹ There was not always an unlnterrupted IdylUc collaboratlon between dUferent soclal strata; dissension and clashes bave always occurred and each strata of soclaty perslsted in the convictlon of Its own superiority. But all these events dld not destroy the unity which was malntained — perhaps under the pressure of some constantly inlmical extemal factors, to which all soclal classes had to offer resistance. For morę details see: Florin Constantlnlu, Relafli agrare din fara RomAneascA in secolul XVII, Bucure?ti, 1972; Strudure soclałe et dioe-loppement culturel des oilles sud-est europłennes et adriatigues auz XVII*—XVIII* siicles. Colloęue inlerdlscipllnaires, Vcnezla, 1971, Bucharest, 1975 etc. Although depictlng the situation exlst-ing at the end of the 19th and In the 20th century, one also finds some reference to the latent conflictual conditlons of earller tlmes in Sabina Comelia Stroescu, La typologie biblio-graphigue des facitles roumaines, vol. I, II, Bucuresti, 1968, 1969.

¹⁸ Relatlon between the autochthons — with deep historical roots — in tlie remote past and the pattem later known as Byzantine, is deflned by Mlrcea Eliade in De la Zalmozis la Ghengls—khan ..., Rom. ed. p. 81—86.

¹⁸ Gabriel ętrempel, Coplęll de manuscrise romdneęll plnó la 1800, Bucurcęti, 1959; Virgil Cdndca, Les intelleciuels du Sud-Est europien au XVII* sleclc, RESEE, 1970, No. 2 and 4 (Romanlan version ln vol. Raliunea dominanto).

²⁰ It would be interesting to find out at what datę our miscellanea began to acquire these characterfstlcs and what aspect acquired the Western or South-Eastem manuscripts at •different stages of the cultural evolution.

“ Mircea Eliade, Les liores populalres dans la liiliratare roumaine, “Zalinoxis”, II, 1939, p. 63—78; continuing B.P. Hasdeu’s linę of thought I. C. Chipmla brings a special argu-mentation In favour of this affirmation, in his works about the popular books.