Averea lui beizadea Ioniţă Cantemir după un catastif din 1755
A ROLL OF THE ASSETS OF PRINCE IONIŢĂ CANTEMIR (1755). STUDY AND TEXT

Summary/Abstract: The present study is, in fact, a more comprehensive presentation of the document published in the appendix. The editor indicates that the document is a manuscript in folio, having dimensions of 21.5 x 33.5 cm, that it is bound with leather covers, without ornaments, it is being kept at the National Archives of Iaşi (manuscript no. 1796), and it contains the wealth inventory of prince Ioniţă Cantemir, son of Antioh Cantemir, Prince of Moldavia (1695-1700, 1705-1707), nephew of Demetrius Cantemir, Prince of Moldavia (1710-1711) and scholar of European range. This inventory, called a roll in the language of the period, was written on 25th May 1755, at the request of Lady Aniţa and Lady Catrina, the heiresses of Ioniţă Cantemir’s daughter, Tarsiţa, who died prematurely sometime in April-May 1755. Lady Aniţa was the sister, and Catrina was the widow of Ioniţă Cantemir, who also died a few months before his daughter, in July 1754. The roll published in this journal contains valuable information about how wealth and assets were being transmitted to descendants in the eighteenth century Moldova, about the Moldavian boyars’ clothing, their business practices, the prices existent in mid-eighteenth century-Moldova, the inventory of an aristocratic court, etc. It follows from this document that the Moldavian social elite was faithful to Ottoman fashion, wearing heavy clothes of expensive fabrics, lined with equally expensive fur, such as: sable, marten, ermine or Cossack fox. At the same time, we find that Moldavian boyars had genuine collections of weapons, jewellery, silver watches etc. Thus, Ioniţă Cantemir had ten soldier swords, a yataghan, five pairs of soldier pistols, nine soldier rifles, a Turkish rifle, a “damaged” Venetian shotgun, two broken rifles, and two silver watches (f. 10v).

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