Snagovian Federation

Snagovian Federation Фєдєрацйа Снагѡвєанъ
Flag Emblem
Motto: "Вєшнйк тръйєштй шѫ-нфлѡрєштй, драг Снагѡв!" "Forever live and prosper, dear Snagov!"
Anthem: Нѡй, Снагѡвєнйй We, Snagovians
Map of Snagov
Status	Active
Capital	Siliștea
Largest village	Ciolpani
Official languages	Snagovian
Recognised national languages	Romanian, English
Ethnic groups (Estimated as of 2022)	90% Snagovians 7% Romanians 3% Gypsies
Religion	Snagovian Orthodox Church
Demonym	Snagovian
Government	Snagovist Federation consisting of 19 villages
• President	Ștefan Marius Snagoveanu
• Vice President	David Robert Mihnevici
• Prime Minister	Albert Henry Jinga
Legislature	Supreme People's Assembly
Independence from Romania
• Snagovian Declaration of National Rebirth adopted	18 June 2020
Population
• 2011 estimate	23,090
Currency	Snagovian ruble (₽)
Time zone	EET (UTC+2)
• Summer (DST)	EEST (UTC+3)
Drives on the	right
Patron saint	Saint Hierarch Anthim the Iberian Saint Voivode Neagoe Basarab
GUM 3-letter code	SGV
Microcode	FS
National animal	European dragon

Snagov (Snagovian: Снагѡв) ([/snaˈɡov/]  (Listen) ), officially the Snagovian Federation (Snagovian: Фєдєрацйа Снагѡвєанъ) is a self-proclaimed state and separatist movement located in Eastern Europe. it is commonly referred to as a micronation by external sources. Snagov claims the entirety of the Romanian communes of Snagov, Gruiu, Ciolpani and Balta Doamnei along with a village from Nuci commune as its de jure territory, however its only sovereign territory is the Cernograd Sovereign Raion. Its de jure territory is the Snagov region, which is the homeland of the Snagovian people, where the people share a common culture, history, language, traditions, customs, ethnicity, etc. This region is located in the Vlăsia plain and is centered around Lake Snagov. Snagov has no cities, instead it has villages. The capital village is Siliștea.

The Snagovian Declaration of National Rebirth was adopted on 18 June 2020. As a federal state, each village in the Federation has some level of autonomy, each one being allowed to have local executive and legislative powers. Snagovism is the official state ideology, which is classified as the Snagovian peoples' one and only leading ideology. Snagov runs on a one-party system, with the Snagovian Workers' Party existing as the sole political party in the Federation.

Snagov is a full member of the Grand Unified Micronational since 11 February 2021 and a full member of the Cupertino Alliance since 30 July of the same year. The Snagovian space agency, Snacosmos is part of the International Aerospace Community since 5 April 2022.

Etymology

Main article: Toponomy of Snagov

The name "Snagov" comes from the Proto-Slavic sněgъ, itself coming from the Proto-Balto-Slavic snáigas, meaning "snow". The "-ov" suffix is slavic and is commonly used for place names. The modern Snagovian word for "snow" is снєагъ. All Slavic languages' word for snow is similar. The first attested use of this name is from 23 March 1408, in a deed of Mircea the Elder, issued in the chancellery of the voivode, which referred to the Snagov Monastery.

It's theorized that the name has been used to refer to the region since the Slavic migrations to the Balkans in the 6th century. The Slavs probably named the region after the first thing they saw there, which was the frozen Lake Snagov, which resembled a sheet of snow.

Official names

• 18 June 2020 - 18 June 2021: Snagovian Federal Republic
• 18 June 2021 - Present: Snagovian Federation

The microcode of the Snagovian Federation is FS, and its GUM code is SGV. Internally, SNA or SNG are used.

History

Pre-Slavic history

the shores of Lake Snagov and its surroundings have been inhabited since the Neolithic. The first people to live here were the Proto-Indo-Europeans, which by the 8th century BC they have became the Thracian people. The Thracian tribe that lived around the Lower Danube and surroundings in today's Northern Bulgaria and Southern Romania were the Getae. We know that the first settlement of people in the Snagov region was on the Snagov Island. It seems that for a very long time, people lived in groups that kept moving (every 7-20 years) from one place to another, usually choosing the higher banks of the waters. From the 7th century BC onwards, the Getae came into economic and cultural contact with the Greeks , who were establishing colonies on the western side of Pontus Euxinus, nowadays the Black Sea.

An artistic representation of an early Snagovian lifestyle, in the Codrii Vlăsiei.

According to Herodotus, the Getae were "the noblest as well as the most just of all the Thracian tribes". When the Persians, led by Darius the Great, campaigned against the Scythians, the Thracian tribes in the Balkans surrendered to Darius on his way to Scythia, and only the Getae offered resistance. The Getae were subjected to Scythian influence and were known as expert mounted archers. Between the 5th and 3rd centuries BC, the Getae were mostly under the rule of the flourishing Odrysian Kingdom. During this time, the Getae provided military services and became famous for their cavalry. After the disintegration of the Odrysian Kingdom, smaller Getic principalities began to consolidate themselves. Getic technology was influenced by that of the invading Celts in the 4th and 3rd centuries BC. In the mid-first century BC Burebista organized a kingdom consisting of descendants of those whom the Greeks had called Getae, as well as Dacians, the name applied to people of the region by the Romans. When the Romans had gained control over the Lower Danube region, thousands of Getae were displaced, and, not long thereafter, references to the Getae disappeared from history.

Archeology suggests that the area (although deep in the middle of the old woods) had continuity with flourishing moments about 4000 years ago and about 2000 years ago, when there was even a group of furnaces for metalworking and so the area was integrated at least into larger economic circuits. Thus, the approximately 30 archeological sites around Lake Snagov can't tell us much about the life, achievements and hopes of the first people in the area, nor about the later Getae.

Tools made out of deer antlers from the Neolithic era found in Snagov

Ethnogenesis period

The Snagovian ethnogenesis period lasts from when the migrating Slavs arrived in Snagov, in the 6th century AD, until the founding of Wallachia in 1330. Once Slavs made their way through the Codrii Vlăsiei and eventually towards Lake Snagov and the Snagov region, they gave it said name. The newly-arrived Slavic population quickly mixed in with the already present Romanized Getae, and thus the Snagovian ethnogenesis started. The Seven Slavic tribes were a union of Slavic tribes that was established around the middle of the 7th century and took part in the formation of the First Bulgarian Empire together with the Bulgars in 680−681.

Map of the Balkans in 680 AD, the foundation of the First Bulgarian Empire

The Getae's romanized language (a lot of Vulgar Latin, but with Thracian roots) served as a base upon which the new slavic vocabulary rested. Thus, the Proto-Snagovian language came into existence, as a Slavic language on the South Slavic branch. Unique was, and still is, the latin influence on this language, especially in grammar. The Slavs being peaceful, tolerant people with a preference for agriculture - they managed to collaborate and then even integrate into existing communities, contributing consistently to population growth and then to the promotion of their values and customs. So even in the Snagov region, we find names, place names, customs, mentalities - with obvious Slavic roots.

Not much else is known about the Snagovian ethnogenesis period. What we can assume, though, is that the slavs remained in the Snagov region and permanently established there. Their culture flourished, they cooperated with the other slavic tribes and states in the area, they adopted the Cyrillic script once it was created by the Bulgarians, they practiced agriculture, they fished, they converted to Christianity, by the 1300's, they became, Snagovians.

A Snagovian bust of Vlad Țepeș.

Integration into the Wallachian and eventual Romanian state

Foundation of Wallachia

The Snagovian lands were under the control of the First Bulgarian Empire from its establishment in 681, until approximately the Hungarians' conquest of Transylvania at the end of the tenth century. With the decline and subsequent Byzantine conquest of Bulgaria (from the second half of the tenth century up to 1018), The Snagovian lands came under the control of the Pechenegs, Turkic peoples who extended their rule west through the tenth and 11th century, until they were defeated around 1091, when the Cumans of southern Ruthenia took control of the lands of Snagov. In 1241, during the Mongol invasion of Europe, Cuman domination was ended. A direct Mongol rule over Snagov was not attested, but it remains probable.

Wallachia's creation, held by local traditions to have been the work of one Radu Negru (Black Radu), is historically connected with Basarab I of Wallachia (1310–1352), who rebelled against Charles I of Hungary and took up rule on either side of the Olt, establishing his residence in Câmpulung as the first ruler of the House of Basarab. Basarab refused to grant Hungary the lands of Făgăraș, Almaș and the Banate of Severin. Eventually defeating Charles in the Battle of Posada (1330).

There is evidence that the Second Bulgarian Empire ruled the Wallachian lands up to the Rucăr–Bran corridor as late as the late 14th century. In a charter by Radu I, the Wallachian voivode requests that tsar Ivan Alexander of Bulgaria order his customs officers at Rucăr and the Dâmboviţa River bridge to collect tax following the law. The presence of Bulgarian customs officers at the Carpathians indicates a Bulgarian suzerainty over those lands, though Radu's imperative tone hints at a strong and increasing Wallachian autonomy.

As the entire Balkans became an integral part of the growing Ottoman Empire (a process that concluded with the fall of Constantinople to Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror in 1453), Wallachia became engaged in frequent confrontations in the final years of the reign of Mircea the Elder (1386–1418). Mircea defeated the Ottomans in several battles, including the Battle of Rovine in 1394, driving them away from Dobruja.

Establishment of the Snagov Monastery

(From left to right: Mircea the Elder, Vlad Țepeș, Neagoe Basarab, and Anthim the Iberian, the people who contributed the most to the Snagov Monastery)

A german map of Codrii Vlăsiei from the 17th century. Snagov is spelt as "Znagog" in German. "Kloster Znagog" is the Snagov Monastery.

The Snagov Monastery in 1929, before major restorations.

From Mircea's deed in 1408 forward, the history of the entire Snagov region is linked in one way or another to the Snagov Monastery. From 1428 to 1429 the monastery received donations from Dan II, Vlad Dracul's cousin, Vlad Țepeș's father. In 1441, the monastery received donations from Vlad Dracul and in 1464 from his third son, Radu the Handsome. During the time of Vlad Țepeș (1448, 1456–1462 and 1476) it is considered the richest and most important monastery in all of Wallachia. This is probably one of the reasons why, at the end of the century, the Cantacuzin Chronicle claims Vlad Țepeș as the builder of the Snagov Monastery: "Vlad-Voivode Țepeș, he built the monastery from Poenari and built the holy monastery from Snagov".

On 28 October 1464 there was a document made by Vlad Țepeș, through which Vlad's younger brother, Radu the Handsome, gained more control of the Snagov Monastery. Around 1475, Vlad Țepeș orders the construction of a defensive wall, a bridge, a prison for traitors and robbers, and a tunnel under Lake Snagov. In 1476 Vlad Țepeș is killed in a battle with the Turks near Bucharest. In 1486, a document, written in Old Church Slavonic, then translated into Russian, said that when Țepeș's army drove the Turks away, he left the army alone and climbed a hill, so that he could watch how the Turks were impaled, thinking there were no enemies left there. This led to his death, as the Turks were able to catch him alone on the hill. The head of the voivode is sent to Istanbul, and the body was buried in the Snagov Monastery.

In 1512 the first church is demolished and rebuilt from the ground up by Neagoe Basarab (1512-1521), on the site of the first construction, in the first four months of his reign. The church dedicated to the Entry of the Most Holy Theotokos into the Temple is built of brick, in Byzantine style. It is the church that can be seen today, on Snagov Island, in the middle of Lake Snagov. Later, at the church of Neagoe, work was carried out by Mircea Ciobanul (1545–1552; 1553–1554; 1558–1559), the interior paintings, which present these last founders and their families.

On 3 April 1534 a royal deed of Vlad Vintilă from Slatina was granted to the monastery, stating that “I found out in my holy monastery, the above-mentioned monastery, the book of the great voivode Vlad Țepeș, who died in the village of Bălteni and the book of Neagoe Basarab”. This text is the origin and the proof that Vlad Țepeș was killed near Snagov, in Bălteni, in December 1476. After his beheading his body was buried in the Snagov Monastery by the monks of the monastery. In 1563, Dobromir the Young paints the church, inside are portraits of Neagoe Basarab, with his son Theodosius, and Mircea the Shepherd with his family.

In 1643, Matei Basarab (1632–1654) installs a printing press in Snagov. In 1669 the monastery becomes a political prison for boyars. Between 1696 and 1704, Anthim the Iberian, of Georgian origin, is abbot of the monastery, later metropolitan of the whole of Wallachia. Around 1700, Greek, Slavonic, Georgian, and Arabic church books are printed in Snagov and are circulated in Greece, Asia Minor, and Egypt. In 1704 the monastery passes, at the beginning of the Phanariot era, into the hands of the Greeks; being dedicated to the settlements on Mount Athos. The monastery's money was sent to Greece.

The wooden bridge built by Vlad Țepeș that connected Snagov Island to the mainland was set on fire in 1821, and a floating bridge was built soon after. In 1847, all the gypsy slaves were released, their descendants representing the gypsy minority in present-day Snagov. In 1853, the floating bridge, overloaded with prisoners in chains, collapses into the water, leaving its prisoners and guards dying in the lake. In 1863, secularization of monastic fortunes causes Greek monks to abandon the Snagov Monastery. This puts an end to the regional monopoly on religious events (especially the high fees) and allows for the beginning of church building in most communities around Lake Snagov. From this point onward, the monastery started being repaired. From 1888 to 1907, protests happen in the entire region, the reason is unknown. In the 1880's, nearly a thousand Russian Lipovans migrated to the villages of Dobrosești, Siliștea and Ghermănești. It's probable that a plurality of people from those villages have Russian ancestry.

The Snagovian village of Ghermănești in the early 1900s, the building that is primarly depicted is a library.

Modern pre-rebirth history

Between 1914 and 1918 the First World War took place. The locals' involvement resulted in many deaths, and the plots of land promised to be distributed were late or not given at all. There are monuments in a lot of villages dedicated to those that died. In 1918 the first industrial fishing net was introduced, but it ceased to exist in 1996 for unknown reasons. Between 1928 and 1930, the Snagovian People's House (Snagov Palace) was built by Henrieta Delavrancea-Gibory for prince Nicholas of Romania, brother of King Carol II. Nowadays it stands as the de jure meeting place of the Supreme People's Assembly.

On 25 June 1933, an official holiday celebrating Lake Snagov was established, because of the “Water Day” celebrated at Lake Snagov by King Carol II, Michael I, Nicolae Iorga, and many other top officials, plus representatives of the local community. The assassinations of November 1938, took place in the night towards the morning of November 30, 1938, in Tâncăbești. 14 people were assassinated, prominent fascists, members of the Iron Guard, respectively, Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the absolute leader of the movement. This is seen as an important synmbol of Snagovian Anti-Fascism.

The Snagovian People's House (Snagov Palace).

Just like in the First, in the Second World War (1939-1945) many locals took part, and even more were killed. On 23 August 1945, Ion Antonescu left Snagov Palace to go to Bucharest, at the request of King Michael I, when and where he was arrested. Manfred von Killinger (who lived in a nearby villa in Dobrosești) soon committed suicide because he failed to keep Romania on the side of Germany, as Hitler demanded.

With the establishment of the People's Republic of Romania in 1948, some plots of land were given to the local peasants (as promised during the wars). In 1956, Imre Nagy, a former Prime Minister of Hungary, is brought and detained in Snagov. He was taken back to Hungary in June 1958 and was eventually sentenced to death. Between 1962 and 1972, an international rowing competition called Regata Snagov took place.

Romanian communists meeting at the Snagovian People's House (Snagov Palace) in 1965.

Nicolae Ceaușescu posing for a photo next to Lake Snagov.

Between 1986 and 1989 over 400 homes in Dobrosești, Ghermănești, Ciofliceni, and Vlădiceasca were destroyed as a part of the Romanian systematization process. The villages of Ciofliceni and Vlădiceasca became almost empty, they started being rebuilt only after the fall of Communism in Romania. From 1990 forward, nothing good happened to Snagov, other than illegal deforestation, privatization of once public places, pollution, and mafia culture. Snagov lost its spirit and it became a simple sattelite of Bucharest, just like the others. Thanks to certain local activists however, Snagov is guaranteed a bright future, if they succeed.

Snagovian Declaration of National Rebirth adopted

...

Administrative divisions

The Snagovian Federation is composed of 19 villages, split into 5 communes, except for Siliștea and Dridu, which don't belong to any commune.

Villages of the Snagovian Federation

Flag	Village	Village code	Coat of arms	Motto	Part of	Population	Snagovian Citizens	Area (km2)
	Curcubeu	CCB		Мѫна лꙋ Бѡгꙋ нй-а ѫмпѡдѡбйт плайꙋ The hand of God made our land beautiful	Ialomița Commune	646	-	1,95 km²
	Balta Codrilor	BCR		Бѡгꙋ ѫй фалнйк God is great	Ialomița Commune	917	-	3,98 km²
	Gârla Turcului	GTC		Бръцйа прйчйнꙋйєштє вєсєлйє Brotherhood brings happiness	Ialomița Commune	390	-	2,66 km²
	Bâra	BÂR		Йалѡмйца нй раздєлъ дар йстѡрйа нй сѡйꙋзєштє The Ialomița separates us but history unites us	Ialomița Commune	920	-	2,92 km²
	Volcăria	VOL		Мѫндрйа стръмѡшйлѡр наштрйй The pride of our ancestors	Scroviștea Commune	552	-	3,18 km²
	Piscu	PSC		Вѡлнйчйє шѫ слѡбѡдєнйє Independence and liberty	Scroviștea Commune	790	-	5,31 km²
	Ciolpani	CIO		Бѡгꙋ нй ѡкрѡтєштє плайꙋ God defends our land	Scroviștea Commune	2828	-	6,82 km²
	Izvorani	IZV		Дѫн малꙋрйлй Снагѡвꙋлꙋй прйвйм ръзърйтꙋ From the Snagov's shores we watch the sunrise	Snagovul Pogor Commune	641	-	4,44 km²
	Tâncăbești	TÂN		Райꙋ пй Зємлйа Heaven on Earth	Snagovul Pogor Commune	1385	-	6,01 km²
	Vlădiceasca	VLĂ		Фалнйкꙋл Влад нй-а спрйжйнйт The great Vlad defended us	Snagovul Pogor Commune	341	-	3,04 km²
	Ciofliceni	CFL		Тръйм We still live	Snagovul Severn Commune	1223	-	3,12 km²
	Ghermănești	GHE		Ѫмбръцйрє шѫ мꙋнкъ Brotherhood and labour	Snagovul Severn Commune	2560	-	3,57 km²
	Dobrosești	DOB		Мѫндрйє шѫ славъ Pride and glory'	Snagovul Severn Commune	1763	-	5,20 km²
	Șanțu-Florești	ȘȚF		Пй малꙋрйлй Снагѡвꙋлꙋй On the Snagov's shores	Gârlița Commune	745	-	2,64 km²
	Gruiu	GRU		Пй Гѫрлйца ѫй нашъ дѡмъ On the Gârlița, is our home	Gârlița Commune	1997	-	5,20 km²
	Lipia	LPA		Сйла нѡрѡдꙋлꙋй The power of the people	Gârlița Commune	2272	-	2,60 km²
	Balta Cernă	BCN		Вєакꙋрй кѡдрйй нй-аꙋ ѡкрѡтйт For centuries the forests protected us	Gârlița Commune	283	-	1,94 km²
	Siliștea	SIL		Славъ вєшнйкъ Eternal glory	-	2398	50	12,56 km²
	Dridu	DRI		Рєсѡйꙋзйцй кꙋ фрацйй Reunited with our brothers	-	439	-	7,80 km²