Ada Kaleh, o comunitate dispărută în numele progresului
Ada Kaleh, a community lost in the name of progress

Summary/Abstract: Cyraunis (Herodotus), Fortress Island, all these are the names of Ada Kaleh Island, as it has remained in the consciousness of all, at least of those who have lived, or have heard of this place, which is mentioned in writings, but which seems like a fairy tale land. Until 1970, the Turkish community lived in peace, but the wings of progress spread over the island, with the Iron Gates dam being built on the Danube Gorge. Thus, Turkish and Austrian monuments were moved to Simian Island and the inhabitants were relocated: 70 families left for Turkey, 60 settled in Constanta, other 10 in Orsova, 5 in Turnu Severin and 4 in Bucharest. The statistics would show that only 149 families, about 500 people, have lost their roots, their history, the memory of their places, but statistics are cold, they present data, not the facts and not the people who have carried with them the ethnic heritage of those places. The history of Muslim presence on the island dates back to the early 15th century, when the Ottoman Empire occupied it. In 1718, it was annexed by the Habsburg Empire by the Treaty of Passarowitz; in 1739 it came under Austrian administration, and in 1878, at the Congress of Berlin, the island’s status remained uncertain. A Hungarian journalist, Emil Lengyel, noted that “the island belongs to Turkey, but the peacekeepers have forgotten about it”. After a period when Austro-Hungarian troops stationed on the island, as well as a Turkish civilian administration, in 1923 the territory came under Romanian administration under the Treaty of Lausanne. The island has been described as a land that had a special distinction, being suspended in time and having the flavour of the East. More than half a century after its physical disappearance, the island is still present in the public consciousness, through exhibitions, films, artistic or documentary, and belles-lettres, one of the reasons being the existence of printed images, photographs or postcards, and vintage video, which not only preserve its name but also its heritage, through the stories that accompany every corner captured by the photo-video lens. In the heritage of the Prahova Museum of History there is a collection of 24 illustrated postcards, which capture various snapshots from the island of Ada-Kaleh, starting with 1927, continuing with 1939, 1957, 1960, the last ones being from 1966. through these veritable documents of the period, we can get to know a world which, without being melodramatic, has disappeared, but which can be reconstructed, at least episodically. The “Illustrated Memory” will bring to mind the houses, the landscapes, the life full of oriental charm that once existed in the past.

• Details
• Contents