Excerpts :
Princess Marthe Bibesco
Ana Blandiana
Smaranda Braescu
Madelene “Madi” Cancicov
Nina Cassian
Elena Ceausescu
Ioana Celibidache
Queen Elisabeth of Romania
Princess Gregoire Ghica
Princess Ileana of Romania
Dora D’Istria
Monica Lovinescu
Ileana Malancioiu
Queen Marie of Romania
Dr. Agnes Kelly Murgoci
Mabel Nandris
Countess Anna de Noailles
Ana Novac
Oana Orlea
Ana Pauker
Marta Petreu
Elisabeta Rizea of Nucsoara
Sanda Stolojan
Leontina Vaduva
Anca Visdei
Sabina Wurmbrand
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Elisabeta Rizea of Nucsoara
Peasant Farmer, Resistance Fighter,
(b. ca 1912, Romania) living in the village of Nucsoara, Co
Arges
Communists:
“When these wretched communists came to power they took
everything from us, the land, the wooden carts, -the hair off
our heads – still, what they could not take was our soul.”
(interview given on 20th May 2001, on the occasion of the
private visit to her home of King Michael)
Biography:
Elisabeta Rizea was born before the
WWI, in a small village of the Southern Carpathians, in County
Arges. She was a peasant farmer with a minute plot of land,
a modest wooden cottage, covered in shingles and a few animals.
Her every day’s dress was the national garb, embroidered
with intricate patterns. She left school at the age of 14 to
do, what was expected of her lot - to help making a meagre existence
off her small allotment. Her fierce opposition to the Communist
expropriation and her husband joining the guerrilla fighters
in the mountains led to torture and long years of imprisonment.
She was branded “an enemy of the people” (“dusman
al poporului”) and her household labeled “a home of
bandits” (“casa de banditi”) – the worst
possible indictment in the Comunist state. Once in jail, in
the notorious Pitesti prison, Elisabeta Rizea was held chains
and put on the death row. She outlived her death sentence to
tell her story, after Ceausescu’s fall.
Bibliography:
Deletant, Dennis, “Romania under
the Communist Régime”, Biblioteca Sighet, Published
in Romanian by the Fundatia Academica Civica, Bucharest, 1997.
Rizea, Elisabeta, “Povestea Elisabetei Rizea din Nucsoara”
(“The Story of Elisabeta Rizea of Nucsoara”) Collected
and Edited by I. Nicolau and T. Nitu, Bucharest, Humanitas,
1993, in Romanian).
Cosmaciuc, Calin, “Regele a vizitat-o pe Elisabeta Rizea,
“Monitorul”, 22 May 2001, Bucharest
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