UN GINERE CANTACUZIN ȘI DESCENDENȚII LUI: MARELE PAHARNIC BARBU URDĂREANU. CONSIDERAȚII ISTORICE ȘI GENEALOGICE
A Cantacuzino son in law and his offspring: the great cupbearer Barbu Urdăreanu. Some historical and genealogical reflections

Summary/Abstract: The biographical case studies are a useful tool for social history, providing insights into people’s relationship with their historical time and into the intricate correlation between agency and socio-political structures. They are also relevant for capturing the historical collective turning points and their socially and culturally constructed universe. The present study aims at the „reconstruction”, as far as the sources allow it, of the life and career of the great cupbearer (paharnic) Barbu Urdăreanu and of his wife, Elina, prince Şerban Cantacuzino’s daughter. The article also follows their descendants’ destinies throughout six generations, covering more than three centuries, from the 17th to the 19th.These families belonged, by origins and social status, to the Romanian elite of their time; they lived in more or less extensive groups, linked by complex kinship relations, based on matrimonial alliances, „spiritual” affinities and political affiliations. Each of the six generations strived to preserve the status of the family, deploying an array of social and matrimonial strategies. When the political circumstances were favourable, some members of the family managed to reach important positions in the reigning council. In this way, they not only strengthened their own social status, but they also added to their family's wealth. At the end of their lives, they partitioned their wealth between their family and the Church, donating for the „commemoration and forgiveness of sins”. Significantly for the mind-set of an emerging new era, the last descendent of the family, General Constantin Năsturel-Herescu, left a large part of his wealth to be used for philanthropic and cultural projects.

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